


body horror

by deepestfathoms



Category: The Prom (2020), The Prom - Sklar/Beguelin/Martin
Genre: Accidental Dehumanization, Alternate Universe - Wings, Anxiety, F/F, Guilt, Hallucinations, Hearing Voices, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Magic, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Mom Friend Alyssa Greene, Psychosis, Secrets, Symbolism, Thriller, emma is a cutie, i made a whole characterization and backstory for a BACKGROUND CHARACTER, some redhead worries everyone: the fanfiction, sorry I don't make the rules - Freeform, the carrot top really be going through it, there's some pandora's box type shit going on in this, this is using my wing au/avian world so. there's a lot of world building
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-13 12:00:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 29,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28777929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deepestfathoms/pseuds/deepestfathoms
Summary: You're not supposed to seal away your problems and emotions in a bottle. Winnie takes this a bit too seriously. But instead of a bottle, it's an antique box she bought for six bucks at some flea market that came through Edgewater for a week. Oh, also, she's pretty sure it can talk to her.
Relationships: Alyssa Greene/Emma Nolan, Kaylee/Kevin/Shelby (The Prom Musical), Mrs. Greene/Angie
Comments: 11
Kudos: 10





	1. Beowulf's Guide To The Avian Race

**Author's Note:**

> two (2) people on TPD said they wanted to read a fic based on a concept i shared last night so here we are!

##  **Avems**

**Description:** Feathered wings, crest feathers, and tail feathers of varying colors depending on the bird they take after; tufts of feathers on ears; sometimes there feathers on the arms, chest, stomach, and face (location and amount shifts from person to person); talons on their hands and feet; two eyelids

 **Abilities:** Heightened sight; generally strong fighters and fliers; powerful talons; projectile feathers

 **Classification:** Male- Rooster/cockerel; Females- Pullet/hen (but only if she has had children); Non-binary folk- Ave; Children- Chick

 **Goddess:** Abiel

———

##  ** Hydras **

**Description:** Scaled wings and tail with varying colors, patterns, and features; can have a variety of distinct features like webbed frills behind their ears or spikes on their wings; horns; claws on their hands and feet; scales on various body parts, but always on their palms; pointed ears; two eyelids

 **Abilities:** Heightened sense of smell; firebreath or frostbreath; spur growth from elbows, ankles, shoulders, and wingtips

 **Classification:** Male- Drake; Female- Dragoness; Non-binary folk- Draco; Children- Wyrm

 **Goddess:** Haniel

———

##  **Cimexs**

**Description:** Insect wings of varying shape, sizes, and color depending on bug type; four arms; antennae; chitin on various body parts, but fuzz if the Cimex is an insect with fluff (moth, bumblebee, honeybees, etc); short, curved claws; retractable mandibles in mouths; two eyelids

 **Abilities:** Sense vibrations with antenna;mothand butterfly Cimexs can spin silk from their wrists; bee, hornet, wasp, and yellowjacket Cimexs can extend stingers from their wrists to inject a nerve toxin into enemies; venomous claws or teeth/mandibles, acid-spitting fangs or saliva glands, mandibles with itching acid (Cimexs can only have one of these abilities, not all of them)

 **Classification:** Male- Beckett; Female- Monarch; Non-binary folk- Insecta; Child- Nymphs

 **Goddess:** Cygiel

———

##  ** Vespers **

**Description:** Bat wings of varying size and color; large bat ears; fangs; opposable fingers on wings called dewclaws; retractable talons in their feet and hands; prehensile tongues; fur on stomach and other body parts depending on the Vesper; either a short, rat-like tail or a fluffy bobtail; two eyelids

 **Abilities:** Heightened sense of hearing; night vision; echolocation; blood and raw meat consumption without getting sick; a special moon power depending on what moon they were born under: mind reading (full moon), telepathy (gibbous moon), clairvoyance (half moon), empathy (crescent moon), precognition (new moon)

 **Classification:** Male- Sire; Female- Vixen; Non-binary folk- Fox; Child- Pup

 **Goddess:** Valtiel

* * *

**The Prom Cast:**

**Emma-** Little brown bat Vesper

 **Alyssa-** Violet-green swallow Avem

 **Kaylee-** Green and blue Hydra

 **Shelby-** Peacock butterfly Cimex

 **Dee Dee-** Gold, orange, and scarlet Hydra

 **Barry-** Blue morpho Cimex

 **Angie-** Phoenix Avem

 **Trent-** Giant golden-crowned flying fox Vesper

 **Kevin-** Black-capped chickadee Avem

 **Nick-** Bearded vulture Avem

 **Greg-** Bumblebee Cimex

 **Betsy-** Lavender and silver Hydra

 **Mrs. Greene-** Golden pheasant Avem

 **Winnie-** Magpie Avem


	2. Chapter 2

**_Let me out._ **

The sound of the voice made Winnie’s wings falter, nearly sending her careening out of the sky. She caught herself on an air draft and kept going, shaking her head to try and rid her mind of what she thought she had heard.

It was probably nothing. After all, she did tend to have a pretty wild imagination.

Winnie beat her wings as hard as she could, squinting through the sweat that poured down her face. Her shoulder blades ached in resistance to flight, but she powered through, wanting to finish the fly as quickly as possible. Wind buffeted her body, grabbing at her gym shirt and shorts with claws of gale, trying to drag her down to the ground. She flattened her crest against her head and flew on, huffing with straining, burning lungs.

Coach Dickinson was one of the best teachers in the whole school, but she was a hardass when it came to her activities in class. Winnie wasn’t exactly sure how flying laps could be applied to cheerleading, ESPECIALLY when she was just the manager of the team, but she knew better than to question the hen. The last thing she wanted was to have to fly longer than she needed to.

The avians in front of her dipped low in the sky and she followed, folding her wings to swoop downwards into the forest surrounding parts of the school. There, a clearing had been cut away through the brambles, a nature path for flying and racing. It was colder in the shade beneath the densely-packed trees, but the chill helped the heat infecting her entire body from the exertion of the workout, so she dealt with the numbness that riddled her feathered ears and fingertips.

Okay, but  _ seriously.  _ She understood needing to exercise, but this was a little much for  _ cheer practice.  _ They needed to be doing stretches and flips, not the sky equivalent of the Pacer Test!

**_Let me out._ **

The voice jarred Winnie again. It was her own voice, she realized, and it sounded like it came from right behind her. She shook her head with a snort, trying not to let it bother her. Just a little more to go… 

The class banked a hard left, and a dragonfly Cimex slightly ahead of Winnie nearly tumbled right out of the air when several other avians jetted by her in an airborne stampede of wings and feathers and scales. Cimexs were always slower than other tribes, especially the ones with segmented wings that buzzed and flapped rapidly just to stay flying. But others like moths and butterflies, like Shelby, who was at the front of the pack, covered great distance with their large, powerful wings.

Winnie oddly craved the touch of Shelby’s wings around her. She did that with a lot of people, looked at their wings and imagined what it would be like to be swaddled by them.

There was a startled squawk from behind; a woodpecker Avem had gotten yanked right out of the air by an overgrown branch and was currently wrestling with it (and losing) to get free. Winnie did not want to end up like her because she knew the repercussions of her messing up during the fly. Everyone would laugh at her, she was sure of it.

And she did not want that to happen.

But,  _ God _ , she just wished her brain would turn off for  _ two seconds _ . Every time she closed her eyes to blink, something would be there, scowling, its face splattered in what she swore was blood. And every time it happened, she would be startled like the pathetic baby she was. Over and over again. She didn’t understand why this was happening to her. Probably just school stress, she tried to rationalize, but… 

Up ahead, trees opened their wooden limbs to the back field of the school. Dull grey light bleeding through a thick wall of clouds returned, and Winnie had to squint to not be momentarily blinded.

The end of the course was coming up. Just a few more meters and it would be over. She was so close.

One by one, girls landed like a colorful flock of geese in the winter, touching down on the grass with cheers of victory or sighs of relief or groans of exhaustion. Winnie copied them, flapping her wings carefully as she lowered herself to the ground--

**_Let me out. This is my body!_ **

\--but she overestimated her ability to land while in forward flight, and she catapulted herself forward on accident when her feet touched turf, all while her wings kept pumping her forward. The earth rushed up to meet her, and she soon had dirt in her mouth. Giggles sounded all around her.

“I thought magpies were supposed to be one of the world’s most intelligent animals,” Kaylee said in a good-natured way. Her caterpillar green and sky blue Hydra wings seemed to sparkle like crushed gemstones in the faint sunlight. She kept fanning her golden-dappled ruff around her face like she was trying to keep herself cool. “They can recognize themselves in a mirror but can’t land?”

“Haha, very funny,” Winnie said, spitting out some dirt. She pushed herself up and stretched out her sore black-billed magpie wings. “I can land just fine, thank you very much!”

“Didn’t look like you could,” Shelby said off-handedly, wiping sweat from her face with one of her four hands.

“Hey!” Winnie blustered, her feathers standing on end. “Rude! I CAN land!”

“We’re sure you can, Winn,” Alyssa said gently, trying to smooth things over. Winnie doubted an actual fight or argument would have broken out, but Alyssa was always stepping in anyway, just in case.

“Good job, ladies!” Coach Dickinson called loudly. Even with barely any sunlight, her phoenix feathers were still aglow with shining radiance. They always looked like they were on fire, and Winnie thought it only made her look even prettier. 

No wonder Alyssa’s mother was madly in love with her.

“I think that’s going to wrap up practice for today,” Coach Dickinson said. “Go ahead and get changed. Or just fly home in your sweat, whatever works for you. I have dinner plans.”

“With Alyssa’s mom,” Kaylee muttered underneath her breath, causing everyone to giggle. Coach Dickinson must have heard their murmuring because she rolled her eyes and began flapping her large wings at them.

“Go on! Shoo! Off with you girls!”

The cheer team scattered back to the gym in a chorus of giggles.

Shampoo of lavender and pear, coconut and watermelon, honey and vanilla all mixed together into an overwhelmingly sweet odor that wafted throughout the room. It was almost as thick as the steam whirling from the many hot showers going on. White bars of soap were passed between claws and loud pop music was played over the sound of sputtering water from stall to stall.  Like most places with showers, the locker room was fit with an appropriate drying station for avians. Wings were blown out thanks to three different dryer compartments each of which had six high-powered blow dryers installed in them. Fluffed feathers and chitin were brushed into neatness, horns were wiped down until they were squeaky clean, bat ears were smoothed back.  Sweat soaked t-shirts and shorts were peeled off and replaced with regular school clothes, jewelry, and expensive shoes. Girls pinched and poked one another playfully, tails tugged on, wings beat to splatter droplets in friend’s faces. Dozens of conversations were going on at once, and yet Winnie could still hear a very distinct voice cut through all the noise.

_ Her  _ voice.

**_Let me out! You stole it! You stole my body!_ **

Winnie shook her head like a cow that had flies buzzing around its face. Her eyes darted around everywhere, but she found no culprit to the things she was hearing. It was all in her head, it wasn’t real, and she wasn’t sure if that was better or worse.

A hand touched her shoulder and Winnie just about jumped out of her skin. She whipped around, her crest flaring, and Alyssa gave her an amused, but slightly concerned smile.

“Sorry,” Alyssa said. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

“No, no, it’s okay!” Winnie said quickly. “I didn’t hear you. It’s so noisy in here.”

Alyssa gave a light laugh. “I feel you,” She said. “Maybe it wouldn’t be so loud if SOMEONE would stop blasting their music!”

“What?” Kaylee looked over innocently from where she was dancing on one of the benches. “I can’t hear you over the sound of Taylor Swift’s new album!”

“She’s taking advantage of Coach Dickinson not being here and telling her to stop,” Shelby informed, having to raise her voice to be heard over the blasting sound of No Body, No Crime.

Alyssa and Winnie laughed. 

“Bold of you to assume Coach Dickinson wouldn’t just tell her to turn it up!” Alyssa shouted back, and Shelby laughed. She looked back down at Winnie. “Anyway, there’s a shower open for you.  _ If  _ it’s still open. I kinda got distracted from telling you.”

“It’s okay,” Winnie said. “Thank you!”

Winnie grabbed a fresh towel and her clothes before walking over to the showers.  A stall was opened up, as Alyssa had said, and she slipped inside. She shed her damp gym uniform, dropping it onto the tile floor with a soggy  _ blop _ . After shaking out her sweat-laden wings, she grasped the faucet handle and cranked it until the shower head groaned and shot out a torrent of hot water.

Slicking her hands with white soap, Winnie began to tentatively scrub her body clean of salty perspiration. She rubbed her palms down over her stomach and chest, where a thin smock of black and white magpie feathers were sprouted. They were always very sensitive compared to the rest of her plumage, and she found herself wincing when her claws would sometimes catch on one of the quills and tug them mercilessly.

She ducked her head underneath the rain of water and began washing her fire red hair and pitch black crest. Her crest wasn’t very flashy compared to other Avems; it was a narrow, scruffy little prickle of feathers that usually stayed folded down against her scalp. She slathered her hands in more soap and washed all underneath and on top of them, then moved to the tufts on her ears. The last thing she wanted was to get feather mites.

Washing her wings took the longest. They always got so heavy and annoying, and there was so much she had to clean, but at least she could reach them, unlike her tail feathers, which she had to awkwardly twist around to grab. 

Propping a foot up on the wooden stool in the stall, she began washing her legs. When she pulled her hands back, she saw that her fingers were black.

**_This is_ ** **my body.** **_Not yours._ **

Winnie stared with wide eyes. Black. Blood? On her fingers. Was it--?

She extended her other hand and reached down, scooping out another fingerful, just to make sure…

And there it was. Blackness. Even more. It was thick and globby and had clotted chunks and hard bits in it. The smell was sickly sweet ammonia. Winnie began to tremble.

“Shit,” She whispered.

Her hands flew to her head, claws running through her hair out of habit from stress--which she immediately regretted and cringed over when she realized the black shit had still been on them. She quickly shoved her head back under the shower and began washing her hair out all over again, staring in dismay at the inky black substance slowly crawling down her legs.

Why was this happening? She wasn’t a little kid anymore, she should have been able to control when she excreted this shit! It wasn’t supposed to just come out like she was on her period!

**_Let me out. You’re in_ ** **my body.**

Clouds of ebony billowed through the water when the streams hit the tile. With a jolt, Winnie realized they were going to run into the other stalls if she didn’t do anything, so she quickly shuffled her feet around to dispel the murkiness. 

“Shit, shit, shit!” She hissed to herself.

She knew she shouldn’t have eaten that squirrel. But how was she supposed to know that THIS would happen? It had never happened before! Why now?

**_You’ve had your fun. It’s time to stop this. I want out._ **

“Shut up!” Winnie yelled, only to instantly slap a hand over her mouth.

Even over the music, she knew she had been heard. The girl in the stall next to her, Natalie, a kind Hydra with mango-colored wings, shuffled around awkwardly.

“Winnie?” Natalie called out, clearly confused. 

“Yeah?” Winnie called back in her best not-having-a-panic-attack voice.

“You okay?”

“Yeah.” Winnie swallowed thickly. “Sorry, something just triggered my misophonia is all! All these noises.” She forced a laugh as she swiped at the trails of plasma still dribbling malevolently down her legs.

“Ohhh,” Natalie said. “How do you know you have that? Like, do you have to go to the doctor or…?”

“It’s self-diagnosable, actually,” Winnie said, shaking her leg and staring in dismay when some black splattered on the stall walls. She rubbed it off as discreetly as possible.

“Oh! That’s cool!”

“Yeah!” Winnie washed herself down again after all the plasma was seemingly gone. “Sorry again!”

“You’re good!”

Winnie blew out a stressed breath once Natalie seemed to go back to minding her own business. She looked at the remnants of plasma on her hands and bit her lip.

_ This  _ was not good.

**_You can’t stray from your instincts. It’ll be easier if you just let me out already._ ** **I** **_am Winnie. Not_ ** **you.**

After a few more minutes of waiting underneath the shower, scrubbing herself in soap to get the smell of plasma off of her, she finally dried off and got dressed. Upon stepping out, she found that her friends were about to leave, so she quickly hurried to catch up with them.

“Girl, you’re soaked!” Kaylee said as Winnie squelched up beside her and the others.

“You guys were leaving!” Winnie said. Her wings and tail feathers were actively dripping, but she ignored it. “I didn’t have time!”

“Hey, guys!”

“Emma!”

Alyssa bounded over to the little brown bat Vesper walking over and swept her into a big hug with her wings. Emma giggled and hugged her back, hanging onto her feathers with her dewclaws.

“Gag me,” Kaylee said jokingly, earning a poke from Shelby.

“You waited for us,” Alyssa said to her girlfriend, smiling. She kissed Emma, which made Emma’s fluffy brown bobtail wiggle happily.

“I waited for  _ you. _ ” Emma corrected. “To hell with those other guys.” She waved a wing at Winnie and the others, then shot them a teasing grin.

“Oi! Rude!” Kaylee flared her ruff at them.

“I kid, I kid!” Emma said. 

“Well, you didn’t have to wait,” Alyssa said. 

“Well, I wanted to,” Emma said, matching her tone.

Unfortunately for Winnie, she ended up missing half of this conversation, for she was too wrapped up in her own thoughts and worries.

She got lucky the plasma came when she was in the shower, even if it was a close call. Staining your pants while on your period was one thing, but staining your pants with black shit when your tribe wasn’t supposed to? That was a whole different story. She had to be more careful and maybe cut back on the meat and blood.

**_Yeah right. You can’t change who you really are. Your body doesn’t want this._ ** **My body** **_doesn’t want this._ **

The voice was grating her ears like claws. She found herself wincing, even if it wasn’t really that loud. When she did so, she realized one of Emma’s ears were pricked and she kept glancing over at her strangely.

_ Shit.  _ Winnie thought.  _ She’s reading my mind. Quick, distract her! Think of something stupid! Uhh-- Penguins use rocks to get married. How do all your organs just fit inside of you? Lauren Drew. Titties. _

Emma blinked at her, then snorted. Alyssa furrowed her eyebrows before she seemed to understand. It appeared she had memorized mannerisms for when Emma used her mind reading because she tapped her forehead and said, “You better not be snooping around in other people’s brains again.”

“I’m sorry!” Emma said. “It’s HARD! You know how difficult it is to hear all this gossip and NOT pay any attention to it?”

Alyssa smiled pitifully. “Oh, Emma. You poor, sweet thing.”

“Hey, don’t get mad at her,” Kaylee said, butting back in. “Mind reading sounds EPIC! I’d love to hear what other people are thinking about! All I got is frostbreath and some bone growth.”

“Sucks to suck, scaly!” Emma stuck her pointed, prehensile bat tongue at her.

“Ew! Put that thing away!” Kaylee squealed.

Emma tittered, closing her mouth.

“That’s  _ so weird _ ,” Kaylee shivered, pulling her wings around herself.

Shelby snorted. “Not you getting freaked out over a tongue.”

“It’s so LONG!”

“You coming, Winnie?” Alyssa called over their loud chatter.

Winnie snapped out of her own thoughts once again. “Huh? Oh, no. I gotta get home.”

“To your palace,” Kaylee said, momentarily pausing her tongue freak out.

Winnie rolled her eyes. “It’s not a palace.”

“It kinda is,” Emma said.

“Whatever!” Winnie stepped outside and spread her wings. She waved to her friends. “Bye!”

They all waved back with a chorus of goodbyes, and Winnie jumped into the air, making the short fly back home with her heavy, wet wings.

\----

As much as she hated to admit it, Winnie’s home  _ was  _ a palace, at least according to Indiana’s standards.

The Thompson’s were one of the richest families in the state, and all because of some inheritance and the ownership of a big company. 6 bedrooms, 9 bathrooms, 17,182 square feet, 14.99 acres, and $5,500,000 later, and you had Winnie’s home.

And it was a  _ prison. _

Don’t get Winnie wrong, she was grateful for her housing. She had heard it all before: she was lucky, she had such a nice roof over her head, other people were living in worse conditions or were sleeping on the streets, she  _ knew.  _ But her life wasn’t all glitter and glamour and riches, and all because her idiotic mother decided to sleep with another man behind her husband’s back.

Winnie wasn’t exactly sure  _ how  _ she survived as long as she did. Perhaps it was because Mother and Father’s marriage was already tarnished from the conception of her, so birthing her wouldn’t hurt. But it only made things worse, and she had the memories to prove it.

Stepping into the huge, brightly-lit foyer, Winnie was already met with the sound of her father, a hard-as-nails albatross Avem, talking loudly on the phone from his office. She could smell the dinner their Hydra maid, Maggie, was cooking from the kitchen and hear the loud squealing of her younger siblings watching TV in the den.

“I’m home!” Winnie called out.

No one answered. Not that she was surprised.

Winnie walked up the grand staircase and into her bedroom to start her homework. Her stride was stopped, however, when she dumped her backpack on her bed and made eye contact with her reflection in her mirror.

It looked like her. From the fire red hair to the green eyes to the oil spill iridescent magpie wings, but something was off.

Something was  _ wrong. _

Winnie dared to creep over to the mirror and looked into its eyes deeply. It began to speak in her voice, but she hadn’t opened her mouth.

**_“Let me out.”_ **

“No.”

**_“This is_ ** **my body** **_. You took it from me.”_ **

**** “It’s as much as yours as it is mine. I am me.”

**_“_ ** **You** **_are_ ** **me.** **_I am me. And_ ** **I** **_am_ ** **not** **_a_ ** **bird.** **_”_ **

**** “I don’t care. This is who we are now.”

For a moment, her reflection didn’t answer. Then, it titled its head slowly and said,  **_“You’re ashamed of me?”_ **

**** “You’re a  _ monster.  _ Everyone knows that! We are  _ monsters.  _ Nobody can accept creatures like that.”

**_“You never gave me a chance! You hid me a way before anyone could even see who I truly am!”_ **

**** “No. They knew. They saw. You had your chance.”

**_“You’re nothing but a cowardice imposter. Just wait until everyone finds out what you’ve done. Then you’ll be the real monster between the two of us.”_ **

**** “Why do you suddenly care about what’s going on? This has been in effect for five years now and you never bat an eye!”

**_“That was before we knew what the concept of stress and anxiety and mental health was. But you’ve allowed yourself to become broken down enough to the point where you can’t block me out anymore. I haven’t been quiet. I’ve been screaming for_ ** **five years** **_. Your time is over.”_ **

**** “No, it’s not.”

**_“They’ll all see._ ** **You’ll** **_see. You_ ** **can** **_see. The futures where they find out.”_ **

Winnie screwed her eyes shut tightly, but that only made the awful visions of her friends and family staring at her in disgust even more clear. 

**_“Your spell doesn’t get rid of your true powers. Nor does it suppress your true instincts and anatomy, hence your little incident in the showers earlier.”_ **

**** “Those futures aren’t going to happen. I won’t let them. Nothing is set in stone.”

Her reflection quirked an eyebrow.  **_“Your own doubt will be your downfall.”_ **

**** “I’m done talking to you.”

**_“I’m not the only one here.”_ **

Winnie faltered in her stride to her backpack. She pricked her ear tufts, slowly looking over her shoulder to the reflection, and she realized it wasn’t mimicking her motions. It was still facing forward, staring at her with blazing green eyes.

“What?” She whispered.

**_“Do you hear them screaming, Winnie?”_ **

Winnie’s gaze slowly, painfully slowly, slid over to the small, worn down, antique chest sitting on her dresser. Her wings began to shiver as noises emerged from the horribly still silence all around her. At first, they were garbled and muffled, but then they became clear to her.

It was screaming.

**_“HELP US!”_ **

**_“LET US OUT!”_ ** **_  
_ ** **_“HELP! SOMEBODY HELP!”_ **

**_“WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS, WINNIE?! WHY WOULD YOU LEAVE US IN HERE?!”_ **

The box jumped, its latch rattling and nearly flying right off its hook. Winnie fell backwards in shock, yelping out loud as the box continued to move and quake. The tremors got so bad that she shought the contents were going to burst out at her, and she instinctively threw her wings over her head in a vain attempt to protect herself from the resulting explosion.

**_“They want out, Winnie.”_ **

**** “Stop it…”

**_“_ ** **I** **_want out.”_ **

**** “Stop…”

**_“Let us out!”_ **

**** “Stop it! Just stop!”

“Winnie?”

“Just shut up already!!”   
A split second later, Winnie’s words caught in her throat a bit too late because she realized she had screamed at her very confused and very concerned-looking maid.

“Ah--” Winnie felt shame infest her entire being like an army of fire ants. 

“Are you alright, dear?” Maggie asked, tilting her head. Her navy blue and goldenrod yellow wings were pulled tight against her back, clearly startled by being yelled at.

“Umm--” Winnie looked around, realizing that the chest was now still and her reflection was back to normal. She swallowed thickly. “Y-yeah. I’m fine.”

Maggie didn’t look very convinced, but she nodded anyway. “Alright…” She said slowly, then straightened up. “I came to tell you that dinner is ready.”

“Oh. Th-thank you. I’ll be right down.”

Maggie nodded and, with a final departing glance, disappeared from the doorway and down the hall. Winnie waited until her footsteps were completely out of earshot before sitting up slowly, still trying to catch her breath. When she looked up, her reflection was gazing down at her.

**_“What I’d be without me,”_ ** It mused. Its eyes became cold and hard.  **_“What should we do with your body?”_ **


	3. Chapter 3

**“Why do you wear that necklace all the time? I swear, I’ve never seen you without it.”**

**“It was a gift.”**

**“From who?”**

**“None of your business.”**

**“Won’t tell me, huh? I bet you stole it. You did, didn’t you?”**

**“What? No!”**

**“You know the stereotype about magpies. They’re little thieves. I guess you just proved that.”**

**“Shut up! I didn’t steal anything!”**

**“I don’t blame you, though. It’s a nice necklace. Let me see.”**

**“No!!”**

**But it was too late. Nick had already yanked off her necklace. In an instant, his smirk faded into an expression of disgust and horror as Winnie could feel her bird-like features melting away into something far more sinister.**

**“Wh-what the hell?” Nick backed away, along with several other people in the hallway. “What the hell are you, freak?!”**

Winnie gasped and jerked back in her chair, ripping herself from the vision. She blinked several times, taking deep, calming breaths that wouldn’t stop hitching in her throat. She looked down at the Algebra homework she had been doing, and found that she had written  _ “I didn’t steal anything”  _ on the page instead of the answer to the equation she was on. She erased it and hoped her teacher wouldn’t be able to discern the faint letters left behind from the lead.

Delving into futures like that was always less fun than she had expected from the power of precognition. All the different timelines were like one conjoining web inside of her head, and she couldn’t help but get lost in them when she accidentally got a hold of a thread. It led her down a path that was hard to get out of once she was deep into all the potential futures.

Yanking open one of the drawers at her desk, Winnie pulled out a leather-wrapped journal (also an antique she had bought at a flea market) and flipped to an empty page, for all the other pages were already filled with numerous different distinct futures that she had thought were important. Grabbing her pencil, she began to write.

_ Avoid Nick at all costs tomorrow!!!! He will try to remove your necklace!!!! DO NOT LET HIM!!!! _

Winnie tentatively touched the necklace that had been locked around her neck for the past five years. It was a simple handblown glass teardrop that was filled with dandelion seeds on a bronze chain, but she loved it. And it was extremely important to her, especially now.

Sighing tiredly, Winnie finished up her notes of the future she had seen, then tucked the journal away into the drawer where it belonged. She sat back in her chair, wings flopped out to either side of her, and looked up at the ceiling for a long time. It wasn’t long before her eyes slid over to the chest, however, and she found herself staring at it intensely, as if she were waiting for something to pop out of it.

Nothing did.

“I’m driving myself crazy,” She muttered.

Finally, Winnie got up. 1:23 in the morning was definitely the best time to change into her pajamas, she rationalized in a vain attempt to lighten the impending sense of doom she had been feeling for hours since she got home. She quickly got into bed, curled up underneath her blankets, wrapped herself in her wings, and dreamt of arms ripping her to pieces all night long.

* * *

If there was one thing that Winnie really, truly hated, it was the stark belief by everyone around her that the world was black and white.

Black and white. Good and Evil. Angels and Demons.

Right from the moment she was old enough to understand the concept, she had been told the same damn thing, over and over again.

If you weren’t an angel then you were a demon. If you weren’t a demon, either, then you weren’t a person.

In a world where everyone had wings, Winnie had too much.

In a world that believed that all people with bright, colorful wings were angels that wouldn’t hurt a fly but were often sanctimonious and arrogant, Winnie was nothing.

In a world that believed that all people with bat wings were demons, cruel and twisted but bore so much more passion than their feathered counterparts, Winnie was less than nothing.

Mutant.

It was a name that even outstripped the title of coward that her birth father had been given for fleeing his scandalous one-night-stand partner and malformed daughter. The same title she had earned when she entered school, where she had been surrounded by wings swathed in accessories and chains and silk. But then, no one expected a mutant, something more like an animal than an avian, to understand loyalty and honor could they?

She wondered if she were only kept alive for the challenge, the adventure of taming the wild beast that lived in Edgewater, Indiana. She wasn’t much of a beast in that respect, either, too quiet, too shy, and too content to spend her time writing goddesses know what and playing with stuffed animals in her room- she’d been a disappointment from the first day.

Papa hadn’t loved her. Mother still didn’t love her, even after--

It was all so tiring. Years of darkness of meeting people who either looked at her with disgust (secure in their superiority), fear (of the beast she was) or pity (for the poor, lost creature that tried to be an avian but couldn’t possibly be). She tolerated those that feared her far more than those that pitied or were disgusted.

“Winnie?”

Winnie’s head jerked up, eyelids scraping against dry corneas, crest feathers waving around her skull. She blinked slowly, and her stomach dropped as she realized what she’d done.

“Winnie? Are you good to answer the question?” Miss Allen asked, her eyes full of concern. She was a tall Hydra woman, as stubborn as a mule, but had a soft spot if you knew how to get to it. Her yellow-orange and scarlet wings twitched as she looked at Winnie.

The whole class stared, and Winnie’s chest and throat tightened along with her stomach. “I'm sorry, Miss Allen,” She said softly. “Number seventeen?”

“Eighteen.” Her teacher frowned.

Winnie’s wings crept up nearer her ears but she read the answers she had carefully printed on her study guide. She’d done all but two without referencing the book. “According to the passage,” She tried to keep her voice from wavering when she noticed Emma staring at her out of the corner of her eye, and not in the way everyone else was. “Beowulf’s Law was created to…”

“Now can you answer it?”

Winnia swallowed thickly, trying not to squirm in her seat. She always hated talking in class.

“It was, umm, created to protect hybrids. After five repeated offenses, a hybrid is allowed to strike back against abuse as long as there’s proof of the mistreatment.” She shifted, looking up at Miss Allen. “Right?”

“Right. Thank you, Winnie.” The sleeve of Miss Allen’s tweed jacket rode up her arm as she pointed to another student. “Jeremy, number nineteen.”

The goldsmith beetle Cimex she had pointed to perked up to full attention and riled through his packet, causing the class to giggle and Miss Allen to roll her eyes. After a moment, he said, “Uhh, number nineteen. When was Beowulf’s Law implemented? It was on July 2, 1964, wasn’t it?”

Miss Allen nodded. “That’s right. Thank you, Jeremy.”

Winnie ducked back into her notebook, which wasn’t even for that class, biting her lip. She looked over her calculations for the eight problems she had created: two leaving out each variable, one set in a frictionless environment, the other set in a real environment. The rest of the class was soon moving on to the next page of the packet, while Winnie turned the page of her personal notebook to the several dozen problems she’d created and solved for balls rolling across flat surfaces (with and without friction), up and down slanted surfaces, for boxes being moved from a stationary position, being pushed along a flat surface steadily, being pushed up an incline. She was constructing an angle-of-ricochet calculation, wanting to stay ahead, not wanting to fall behind, wanting to stay as far from the web as possible, and she realized these were all cryptic calculations for the outcomes of all the futures she had seen. 

Glancing to the side, Winnie noticed Emma side-eyeing her. When they made eye contact, Emma jerked her head away and looked forward, her big bat ears flopping around her head with the sharp motion.

She had been in her head.

Winnie couldn’t have been the only avian who had a problem with mind readers. She didn’t like them poking around in her brain, just getting as much information as they wanted, whenever they wanted it. She knew there was a way to shield her thoughts from mind readers, but she didn’t have the focus to do so. Her mind was always just going, going, going, going, never stopping, always stressing over every little thing, especially now. And it wasn’t like yesterday’s revelation was difficult enough to process, but now she had someone who could discover her secrets at any moment.

_ Think about something else, Winnie, think about something else… _

A great blue skimmer Cimex suddenly raised her hand.

“Yes, Valarie?”

“Why does Beowulf’s Law even exist?” Valarie asked. “I mean, I get  _ why  _ it exists, but why name it after someone who nearly mass murdered the entire population?”

“That’s a good question, Valarie,” Miss Allen said. “Do you know the story of Beowulf?”

Valarie nodded. “He was the first recorded Magi. He and his sister, Ophelia, I mean. They were both hybrids- Hydra and Cimex, right? Anyway, he ended up going crazy and tried to kill all pureblooded avians for the mistreatment of his sister, but he was cursed to turn into stone by Ophelia before he could actually act on the plans. The statue is still in England. People say he’s still alive and can be set free.”

Miss Allen nodded. “Very good. The law is named after him because it’s there to protect hybrids and give them a chance to strike back with repercussions. That’s what he was going to do, even if his plans were a bit rash and violent.”

Another kid, a European goldfinch Avem, raised his hand and Miss Allen nodded at him.

“But he was going to kill all avians!” The kid exclaimed. 

“But did he?”

The kid faltered, his feathers puffing up like he was embarrassed. “Well-- no.”

“Exactly.” Miss Allen said. “We can’t fault someone for something they were  _ planning  _ on doing, only for what they’ve done. Actions speak louder than words or, in this case, a few thoughts someone  _ might  _ have gone through with.”

Just then, the bell rang, and everyone got up to leave.

“Alright. Turn in your notes, and remember, the test is tomorrow.”

Half the students were out the door before she said the word “test”, and by the time Winnie was dropping her note pages into the turn-in-box, the room was nearly empty. Miss Allen said her name, and she stopped, shouldering her backpack.

“Are you all right, Winnie?” Miss Allen asked once she walked closer. “I’ve never seen you anything other than alert.”

Winnie forced her eyes from her jacket to her face. Adults often called an averted gaze disrespectful. “I was up late studying. Thank you for asking.”

“Are you sure that’s all?” Miss Allen pressed further. “You can talk to me, you know that, right?”

Winnie nodded. “Thank you, but I’m okay. I just have a lot on my mind.”

_ Or someone  _ in  _ my mind. _

_ I need to get rid of Emma Nolan before she hears something we’ll both regret. _


	4. Chapter 4

Winnie could still remember the day she first found out she was different, and not because of the way she looked.

She was seven years old and up in her room, playing with her stuffed animals. Her toys were her only friends for a majority of her life, up until she made everything Better. On that specific day, she was playing Kingdom and was setting up all her plushies in a row so they could watch her be crowned as queen, but her elephant kept tipping over. After three tries of trying to get it to stand up, she had finally yelled, “Urrg!! Sir Elephant, it’s NOT BEDTIME! I’m the queen now and I ORDER you to stand up!”

And, like that, the elephant was upright. 

Winnie had felt the surge of power in her clawtips, almost like little fireworks were going off inside. She looked at her tiny hands in awe, realizing she had magic without even knowing what Magi was at the time. She wanted to tell her parents, but something inside of her stopped her. Even now, eight years later, she sometimes debated on sharing her secret with them, but then she took one glimpse into a future where she did and remembered exactly why she had to hide herself.

Winnie hurried into one of the school bathrooms, thankfully finding it empty. She was going to be late at this point, but she could hardly care. She needed to do something about Emma Nolan and her intrusive mind reading.

Slipping inside the furthest stall, Winnie set her backpack down and began rummaging through it hastily. She had to hurry up before someone came in and caught her.

Pencil? No. Too long.

Pen? No. Also too long.

Notebook? No. Too big.

This crumpled gum wrapper she forgot to throw away from goddesses know how long ago? No. Trash. She threw it in the trash can.

Eraser? Hmm…

Winnie looked down at the blue pencil-top eraser sitting in her palm. It would have to do.

Closing her fingers around it, she took a breath and said, “Eraser, I enchant you to become an earring. Please.”

In her hand, the eraser began to tremble like an egg about to hatch. Then, as if they were made of the softest material to ever exist, the edges began to stretch out into a hook and the center rounded out into a smooth, flat, circular shape. The rubber chipped away, revealing gold and green underneath.

Within just a few seconds, the eraser had turned into an earring that was shaped like a bumblebee. It was gold, studded with rhinestones, and had a fake emerald for an abdomen.

“Not exactly what I was exactly,” Winnie said, holding it up to the light for an inspection. “But it’ll do.”

Winnie clutched the earring close to her chest. She could feel the magic tingling in the tip of her claws, ready to be released. It was such an exhilarating sensation, like holding a ball of charged electricity in the palms of her hands.

“Earring, I enchant you to alert the wearer whenever someone is trying to read their mind.”

Winnie felt her body grow hot, temperature spiking until she felt like she was riddled with fever, but the sensation was painless, almost blissful, as if she were rolling in molten golden sunlight. Her heart thumped heavily against her rib cage, nerves tingling with the power of the magic coursing through her veins. It flowed out through her clawtips, filling the earring with the enchantment’s properties. 

“Good.” Winnie whispered. She brushed her hair out of the way and brought the earring to her left ear--

\--only to remember that she had never gotten her ears pierced before.

Biting her lip, Winnie knew she shouldn’t risk another enchantment when she was so on edge, especially one that would alter her own body, so she sucked in a sharp breath and shoved the earring through the sensitive flesh on her earlobe.

Instantly, she hissed in pain, gritting her teeth through the discomfort. Now she understood why people got their ears pierced at a young age. They’d be too little to remember THAT.

When she pulled her hand away from rubbing her now-sore ear, her heart jumped when she saw a few splotches of purple on her fingertips.

Blood.

Frantically, she grabbed some toilet paper and began gently dabbing it against her ear. It wasn’t bleeding very much, luckily, but it was enough to make her anxious and paranoid all over again.

**_I told you, I told you, I told you…_ ** That damn voice echoed in the back of her head.

“Shut up,” Winnie growled under her breath. She threw the wadded toilet paper into the toilet and flushed it down the drain, sighing. “It’s fine.  _ I’m  _ fine.”

There was no answer, but she still thought she could hear her own voice hissing to her softly. Like the sound of the AC was warping into whispering breaths, taunting her, setting her on edge.

Picking up her backpack, Winnie quickly headed out of the bathroom and to the auditorium for her theater class. Upon stepping inside, the teacher, a friendly giant golden-crowned flying fox Vesper named Mr. Oliver, opened up his wings to her from the stage and shouted, “Winnie! You are late!”

All the kids sitting in the first row of seats turned to her, and she instinctively hunched her wings in awkwardly.

“Sorry,” She said as she shuffled down the aisle.

“Oh, it’s fine,” Mr. Oliver waved a wing dismissively. “It’s only a few minutes. Now, all of you, come on up here, we’re about to begin.”

And so, the class engaged in a ritualistic theater game of Ships and Sailors as a warmup. As they were being commanded to do certain things by a dark-eyed junco Avem named Marcus, Winnie heard a faint buzzing in her left ear, as well as felt a slight tingling against the skin, as if there were a bee flying around it. She was confused for a moment, then remembered her enchantment.

Emma was reading her mind.

Winnie side-eyed the Vesper, who wasn’t looking at her, rather obeying the command of Lover’s Leap with Alyssa, but she knew she was probing through her brain.

_ Get out of my head, Emma Nolan. _

Emma flinched in Alyssa’s grasp, which made her girlfriend look down at her in concern. Her head whipped around to Winnie, and Winnie did her best to not look over at her to avoid being too suspicious. She knew it was possible for mind reading to be detected without any assistance from magic, so perhaps that was what Emma would assume this was.

Perhaps she should just stop thinking about this because her earring was buzzing again.

_ I said get out. Seriously. You have no right to be inside my head. _

Emma faltered during Captain’s Coming and Marcus called her out. She made eye contact with Winnie while she was walking off of the stage, and Winnie did her best not to narrow her eyes at her.

As the game came to a conclusion, Nick, a cocky bearded vulture Avem, sauntered up to Winnie as she was going to sit back down.

“What’s with the weird new earring?”

“What about it?”

This felt…familiar. 

“It’s just weird, that’s all. Why do you only have one?”

“It’s a style choice.”

“Where’d you get it?”

“It was a gift?”

“From who?”

“None of your business.”

With a jolt, Winnie realized this conversation was almost exactly the same as the one from her vision the night before. The focus wasn’t on her necklace, which was good, but Nick was still making her blood boil with all his annoying questions.

“Won’t tell me, huh? I bet you stole it. You did, didn’t you?”

“What? No!”

The words were bubbling from Winnie’s throat without her consent, as if she had been programmed to have this exact conversation.

“You know the stereotype about magpies. They’re little thieves. I guess you just proved that.”

“Shut up! I didn’t steal anything!”

“I don’t blame you, though. It is pretty cool. Let me see.”

“No!!”

A sharp pain exploded across the side of Winnie’s head as Nick’s reaching claws snagged on the edge of the earring and ripped it right out. Her own claws lashed out as she staggered backwards with her other hand clasped over her ear. When she looked up, Nick was seething, his face dripping with blood from the four scratches slashed across his skin.


	5. Chapter 5

Winnie wished her parents would stop staring down Principal Hawkins as if he were a worm writhing on a sidewalk after it rained, practically begging to be eaten. They always seemed to do this with every authority figure they came in contact with, sizing them up and gauging how much power they held over them.

Principal Hawkins barely even seemed like a threat to them, though. He was incredibly mellow, laidback mottled tortoise beetle Cimex who rarely ever shouted, let alone got mad over things. He was more of a sweet pushover rather than someone who would endanger her parent’s power.

“Thank you for coming as quickly as you did, Mr. and Mrs. Thompson,” Principal Hawkins said. “You too, Mr. and Mrs. Boomer.”

Winnie glanced over at Nick and his parents from where she was sitting across from them. His mother, a common starling Avem, was pressing a wet rag to her son’s scratched face, while his step-father, a royal blue Hydra, was staring at Winnie’s hunched form, as if he were trying to figure out how someone as meek-looking as she was could have possibly hurt Nick like she did.

“This shouldn’t take long,” Thomas said in his typical I’m-Rich-So-I’m-Smarter-Than-You voice, and Winnie prayed to the four goddesses that he wouldn’t say something rude. “This all must be a terrible misunderstanding. A set up to try and tarnish our family’s name, I bet.” He glared at Nick’s family.

“Father!” Winnie yelped before anyone else could say anything in return. “That’s not what happened!”

“There was a small incident during their theater class,” Principal Hawkins said quickly, trying to smooth things out. “A fight broke out between Nick and Winnie. Luckily, Mr. Oliver was able to break it up before it could escalate, but Nick was injured before that.” He nodded to Nick’s face. “Fortunately, his eyes and nose are okay. The scratches weren’t very deep.”

“Still hurts like hell, though,” Nick grunted, wincing, and Winnie couldn’t tell if he was being serious or if he was just playing it up to make her look bad.

“I’m sorry,” Winnie whispered shamefully, regardless of what Nick’s intentions were with his comment. She knew her guilt was real, even if Nick’s probably wasn’t. All she wanted to do was wrap herself in her wings, melt into the floor, and disappear forever. “I-I didn’t--” She shut her mouth and looked away.

“What, Winnie?” Principal Hawkins looked at her.

“Nothing.” Winnie said quickly, stealing a fearful glance up at her parents. 

Principal Hawkins pursed his lips, studying Winnie for a moment, then asked her and Nick, “What was this fight over?”

“She just attacked me!” Nick bursted out. “I was just messing around with her and she lashed out at me like a rabid dog or something!”

At the same time, Winnie mumbled, “He took my earring.”

Principal Hawkins’s antennae twitched. “What was that, Winnie?”

Winnie looked up at him, then at her parents, then at Nick, and then back down at the floor, shaking her head. Hoarsely, she whispered, “Nothing. I didn’t say anything.”

“It’s okay, Winnie,” Principal Hawkins said gently, and Winnie couldn’t help but raise her gaze back up to him. His eyes were so warm and caring, as if he were seeing her as a baby bird in need of help. “You can tell us.”

Winnie shifted in her seat, opening and closing her mouth a few times as she glanced at Nick, who was giving her a narrow-eyed stare, again. After a moment, she finally said, “H-he, umm…he took my earring.”

Principal Hawkins raised an eyebrow and looked at Nick for his side of this story. “Is this true?”

Nick scoffed and crossed his arms. “Okay, so I took her earring?” He said. “She still did THIS!” He gestured for his face. 

“Did you give the earring back?” Principal Hawkins asked.

“Uhh, yeah.” Nick said. “It was  _ weird.  _ I didn’t want it.”

“Then why did you take it in the first place?”

Nick fumbled for an answer for a moment, then finally sputtered out, “I thought it would be funny.”

“Clearly it wasn’t,” Principal Hawkins said as he looked back to Winnie. “While a stolen earring doesn’t excuse attacking another student, I do understand that you probably lashed out the way you did because you felt threatened or uneasy. Is this true?”

Winnie nodded wordlessly, not daring to look at Nick. She could already feel his heated glare drilling into her wings, as if he were hoping to set the feathers on fire with the leer alone.

“I see.” Principal Hawkins said.   
  
“She’s always ‘threatened’ or ‘uneasy’!” Nick said. “She always hides in her wings like she’s a chick! I was just trying to help her open up! We were messing around!”

“Nick.” Mrs. Boomer said.

“Please, Nick. Raising your voice isn’t necessary.” Principal Hawkins said. He turned to Winnie. “Did you put your earring back in?”

“Oh, umm--” Winnie shifted again. “Uhh… I-I can’t.”

Principal Hawkins furrowed his eyebrows. “Why not?”

“Umm-- B-because, umm--”   
  


“Are you alright, Winnie?” Principal Hawkins asked, growing concerned.

Unsure on what else to do, Winnie moved her long red hair out of the way so everyone could see the tear in her earlobe. Either sides were dangling loosely and purpling with bruise...or blood. Nick’s mother gasped and whipped her head around to Nick sharply while his step-father leaned in with a whistle.

“Nick!” Mrs. Boomer said.

“Ouch,” Mr. Boomer commented at the same time. “That looks like it’s gonna need stitches.”

Principal Hawkins looked at Nick, his eyes narrowed. “You ripped her earring out?”

“My claws snagged on it when I was reaching for it!” Nick said, his voice pitching slightly.

“It’s easy to write off harming another student with an excuse like that,” Principal Hawkins said. 

“But--”

“I think a three day suspension will be a good enough punishment for Nick,” Principal Hawkins said, cutting the boy off. “Winnie, you’ll be sent home for the rest of the day.”

Winnie nodded silently, while Nick sputtered in disbelief.

“What? That’s not fair!” 

“Nick, you tore her ear.” Mrs. Boomer said sharply.

“You should pay for her medical bills,” Mary piped up after being thankfully silent for most of the meeting.

Instantly, Winnie jolted at those words. “No!” She exclaimed. She looked at Nick’s family. “No, no, it’s okay. Don’t listen to her. I’m fine.”

Mary set one of her four hands on Winnie’s shoulder, a feigned sense of comfort. Her claws, serrated and recurved like the praying mantis she took after, dug into her skin, unknown to everyone else.

“It is  _ not  _ fine, _Guinevere_.” Mary said. “He  _ hurt you _ .”

Winnie tried not to react to the pain. “It’s fine, really. Mother, it’s fine.”

“We could sue,” Thomas mused.

“No!” Winnie cried, her eyes going wide. “Father, don’t!”

Principal Hawkins and Nick’s family both looked concerned by her outburst, while her parents seemed to be trying to tame their anger with being talked back to. Winnie hunched her wings in, wanting to disappear.

“It’s okay,” Winnie whispered. “Please, it’s fine.”

Principal Hawkins, sensing her distress, said, “Nick will have a three day suspension, but his family won’t have to pay for any medical bills. That’s final.”

* * *

“What the fuck were you thinking, talking back to us like that?”

Winnie knew the angry, swear-filled scolding was coming, but she hadn’t expected it to come so late. Her parents had waited to get back to the house before they began tearing strips off of her, which she was incredibly thankful for.

“You were making a scene,” Winnie said.

Mary narrowed her eyes dangerously. “What did you just say?”

Winnie pulled her wings in close. “I-I--”

“Don’t disrespect us, girl.” Thomas hissed, glaring daggers at her.

“I’m sorry,” Winnie dipped her head apologetically. “I didn’t mean to.”

“You better not have.” Mary said, shifting her shiny praying mantis wings. She flexed her claws and Winnie eyed them nervously. She knew the venom that lied within them; she just got lucky that the stingers hadn’t been deployed in Principal Hawkins’s office.

“My ear,” Winnie said after a moment of tense silence. “Are we, umm…gonna do something about it?”

“I thought you said you didn’t want medical attention?” Mary said, smirking.

“No, I didn’t.” Winnie said. “I didn’t want Nick’s family to pay for it.”

“But we should?”

“I’m your daughter.”

Thomas scoffed. “Barely.”

Winnie swallowed hard, trying to not let the hurt show on her face. She knew the way her family felt about her, especially her parents, but hearing it out loud made it so much worse.

It made it  _ real. _

“B-but— It hurts.”

As fast as a bull whip, Mary lashed out at Winnie. Winnie flinched, expecting a slap, but instead Mary pinched her torn earlobe between two serrated, fishhook-like claws.

Winnie cried out in pain. She didn’t think her ear could hurt any worse, but, per usual, her mother proved her wrong.

“M-Mother! Stop! Stop it, that hurts!” Winnie squealed, bending over sideways like she thought it would help her. She grit her teeth as tears of pain sprung to her eyes.

“Cry, little girl.” Mary purred, a sickening smirk on her face as she backed Winnie up against the wall. “You were happy to do it in your principal’s office.”

“You were—”

There was a squelching of blood as Mary tore her earlobes further with a new, deeper hole. She let out another scream of pain, cracking her head back against the wall. The tears streamed free, burning like lava.

“Please stop,” Winnie begged. “Please, Mother. I’m sorry.”

Mary stared at her intensely, then let go. There was purple blood on her claws, but she wiped it off without a second glance. An upside to the spell.

“Good.” Mary said, smirking. “I’ll rip your whole ear off next time you disrespect us like that.”

“Yes ma’am.” Winnie whispered.

“You’ll be fine,” Mary said. “Now go to your room.”

“Yes ma’am.” Winnie mumbled again. She turned and trudged up the grand staircase, listening to the sound of her eavesdropping younger siblings tittering behind her.

Upon entering her room, Winnie was immediately met with her malevolent, glaring reflection. She glared right back at it as she dumped her bag on her bed and grabbed some tissues on her desk to stem the bleeding from her ear.

**_“You’re ruining my relationship with my family.”_ **

**** “You say that like it wasn’t already ruined.” Winnie said as she began going through a work folder. “I didn’t do anything.”

**_“You did.”_ **

**** “I didn’t.”

**_“You did.”_ ** It narrowed its eyes, and Winnie realized the iridescent black feathers on its wings were falling out, revealing sick green flesh underneath.  **_“And it’s only going to get worse.”_ **


	6. Chapter 6

**_Let me out let me out let me out LET ME OUT LET ME OUT OUTOUTOUT_ **

Winnie closed her eyes, trying not to let the pain show on her face. For the past five or so hours, her mind had been filled with non stop yelling and screeching to be let free. The voices inside of her head were not happy, not one bit, and with nothing else to do, they let out that pent up spiteful hatred on her poor ears.

See, Winnie knew she was damned. She knew she was the worst thing to ever grace the world and she knew that she was an abomination of nature from the moment she was born. But she had her own sense of will, and that made her fight against the extermination of herself.

All she wanted to do was go to school and get her work done, but the endless screaming in her mind was putting her on pins and needles. It didn’t help that every step she took had to be thoroughly thought out, not one bit helpful that she was oh so tired, and that the voices in her head would not leave her be.

**_LET ME FREE LET ME OUT PLEASE PLEASE LET ME OUT_ **

In a way, Winnie could understand what it desired. It wanted peace, a release from the hell that was their imprisonment. And as much as Winnie, deep down inside, longed for that as well, she couldn’t simply kneel over dead and give up everything she had worked for. She couldn’t let that all go to waste. 

Teetering along, Winnie began to make her way to the gym for cheer practice. She was surprised she had been able to make it through the whole day in her state.

**_I want out_ **

Calm, placid.

The sudden voice centered on her startled Winnie out of her reverie, nearly making her careen herself into the wall.

**_Let me free let me free I want my body_ **

They weren’t yelling, and that scared Winnie beyond mere words could convey.

**_You stole it I want it back_ **

Winnie so badly wanted to grab ahold of her skull and try to block out the voices rebounding through her head. The voices were scratching and scraping against her mind, harsh and quick like a whip.

**_Let me out_ **

_ No. NO! _

**_PLEASEPLEASEPLEASEPLEASE_ **

Winnie lurched forward, a breathless scream ripping itself from her throat. It felt like the voices were taking shape and trying to force their way out of her body.

_ STOP! _

**_LET ME OUT LET ME OUT_ **

The physical pain Winnie’s body wielded could not compare to her mental pain. In retaliation to her attempt to silence the voices, they began toiling over in her skull, laying a permanent fog over her thought process and making so many simple things--

Winnie flinched backwards as she nearly fell down the upcoming staircase. --like walking, for example, a dangerous act in and of itself.

And she was starting to realize it wasn’t just  _ her  _ voice she was hearing. There were others, too. There were so many more.

She was so tired, physically and emotionally. She wanted to just go home, curl up in her bed, and sleep forever, but she knew sleep would not be a respite. Not for her.

Winnie walked into the gym, and was instantly met with the sound of music and loud chatter. Almost everyone was already inside, stretching and getting ready. She would have felt guilty for being late if it wasn’t for all the other things she was guilty of at the moment.

“There’s my manager!” Coach Dickinson shouted, opening one golden-orange phoenix wing to her. “Come on, Winnie! I can’t wrangle this team without you!”

Winnie cracked a smile at that. At least some people still needed her.

**_For now._ **

Winnie faltered as she was walking over to the group. The sudden smoothness and clarity of the voice startled her. She had gotten so used to hearing it scream that she hadn’t been expecting it to speak to her fluidly.

“Winnie? Are you alright?”

Winnie looked forward again to see Coach Dickinson giving her an expression of concern. She nodded.

“Yeah, sorry,” She said. “I thought I heard something.” She hurried over to the coach’s side, trying to ignore the hissing in her ears.

**_It will end if you let me free. I want out already._ **

_ No. _

It felt as if someone was taking a knife and stabbing it into her ears over and over and over again until brain matter was spilling out. Her vision blurred momentarily, and even when it cleared, there was no difference. Everything still looked the same--and that was one of the causes of the thumping in her chest. That, among many different things.

It just--

Everything  _ hurt _ . Her head, her stomach, her arms and legs and neck. Her parents didn’t understand why she looked so poorly that morning. And they especially didn’t understand why she was so thirsty when she practically begged for a cup and filled it up with water, which she guzzled down until she felt she was about to vomit.

**_You’re doing this. You’re destroying MY body._ **

A tug on her muscles. A pull on her brain. A heave in her tendons.

Her senses started to come together a little more--or at least she thought they were. She was starting to shake, though, and she didn’t know why but it was awful, so awful. Her teeth clattered and her eyes felt hot and her head was  _ going to explode. _

**_You’re going to pay the price for your theft. Give up now and maybe you’ll be given mercy._ **

She should be used to it by now, she should be immune to this pain. But it hurt, it hurt, it hurt so badly. 

It was inside her, every muscle, every bone, every fiber of her being, this pain so horrible, constant, just another part of her. But today it was worse. It was so much worse. Whatever it was, she hated it.

**_You know what it is. You know the consequences of your actions._ **

It shouldn’t be like  _ this _ . It burned so much hotter, it clawed at her without mercy. It wasn’t right. This wasn’t how things are supposed to be. She wasn’t supposed to feel this way, like everything around her was fire and everything inside her burned, like there was no safety, no happiness, no love, only misery and agony. 

She was supposed to be fixed. She was supposed to be perfect now.

**_No. Never. Not when you’re like this._ **

It burned yet she also felt so cold, so left alone, so bruised and battered, despite being surrounded by people, but they didn’t care. No one cared. Not really. While the fires around her burned, while her insides burned just as badly as the outside, nobody turned to help her. 

**_They don’t care about you. They only care about this false skin you’re wearing. You’re a pathetic excuse for an avian._ **

_ Stop…  _

**_Stop? You want me to stop? Well, I want you to STOP USING MY BODY._ **

It was like her own fire died a little each time. Her heart froze as her body burned, her spirit dying as her nerves came alive with pain, so much pain.

She couldn’t take it anymore, she couldn’t handle all this pain, all this suffering, all this neglect and abuse and hate. She wanted to  _ do something _ about it. For once she wanted it all to just--end.

Her feathers stood on end, as if charged with static electricity. Her eyes stung and rolled back in her skull. Her head ached, and was that drool dripping from her mouth…?

Her throat felt scratchy, like something was trying to crawl its way out of her esophagus, so she let it out.

**_They hate you, I know they do. THEY FUCKING HATE YOU!_ **

Winnie dropped to the ground and began to scream.

Linda, an American kestrel Avem, heard it first--

“WHAT IS  _ WRONG _ WITH HER?!”

\--and then everyone else followed.

Even while she was seizing on the floor, Winnie could feel all their eyes on her. Maybe she would have felt bad about interrupting the routine if it weren’t for the fact that she was choking on the foam bubbling from her mouth.

“Oh my goddesses!” Jules screeched louder than Winnie was screaming. 

“What is she doing?!” Natalie yelped.

“Does she have rabies or something?” Kaylee said helpfully.

“Looks like a seizure,” Jess observed.

Winnie had never had a seizure before, but something told her this wasn’t the same thing at all. This felt like her very soul was being ripped out of her body, bringing all of her guts with it until she was nothing but an empty shell.

“Winnie!”

Golden wings unfurled around her, and Winnie curled into Coach Dickinson, continuing to spasm. Her shrieking was muffled against the phoenix’s chest, but she still couldn’t stop. 

“--out. Get out! Get out!” Winnie shrieked, writhing.

“I know, I know, sweetie,” Coach Dickinson whispered, even though she didn’t know. She had no idea what was going on or how to stop it. But she didn’t let go, even when Winnie managed to grab onto her with her claws digging in.

“It’s okay, Winnie, it’s okay,” She murmured.

“No,” Winnie gurgled. “I-I can’t--”

And then, all the warmth in Winnie’s body seemed to flare into a burning heat beneath Coach Dickinson’s clawtips, her pulse beat heavily under her flesh, and one of the windows exploded into millions of silver pieces.


	7. Chapter 7

Winnie awoke with purple blood in her bed.

What worried her the most wasn’t the intensity of the nightmare, not just yet, not this early on when they weren’t a common problem. It was that she worked so hard to make sure she was stable and okay during the day, and now she was finding out how easily she could rip herself to pieces in her sleep.

Winnie sat up, and the first thing she was met with was the dark stare of her reflection.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Winnie hissed before it could even open its mouth.

**_“You’re ruining my body.”_ **

**** “This isn’t your body.”

**_“Oh, I apologize. My mistake._ ** **Your shell** **_.”_ **

Winnie ignored it and flung her legs over the side of the bed. She began to tug her stained sheets off of the mattress, causing her reflection to scoff.

**_“What’s this? You aren’t solving your problem with magic? Have you created another version of myself that I don’t know about?”_ **

**** “Shut up.” Winnie growled. Though, she much preferred this version of her imprisoned self rather than the one in her head. That version was much harder to ignore; at least she could pretend this one was a real person she was talking to, even though she was sure it was just a figment of her imagination.

Or, at least, she hoped.

Winnie wiped off her bloodstained claws and arms with some tissues, then gathered up her dirty sheets and began walking them down to the laundry room. She was lucky enough to not run into anyone on the way there, as she wasn’t sure how she would explain the purple blood, and the last thing she wanted was to cast any more spells on people.

**_It’s never bothered you before…_ **

**LET ME OUT**

Winnie faltered, sucking in a sharp breath. That voice didn’t sound like it had come from inside of her head. It sounded like it had come from behind her. In her room.

**_They’re waking up, too._ **

**I WANT OUT**

**_You’ve heard them before, I know you have._ **

**LET US OUT**

**_You can’t run from it forever._ **

Winnie continued the walk to the laundry room, this time with a lot more urgency in her stride. She didn’t look behind her, fearing what she may see.

Upon entering the laundry room, Winnie dumped her dirty sheets and blankets into the dryer, added in the detergent, then turned it on. She sighed, leaning against the machine.

Things weren’t looking good for her. This was the second day in a row that she was sent home early, but at least her parents didn’t have to come get her this time. Principal Hawkins had allowed her to fly home on her own, which she knew he worried over, but she was grateful for the decision. 

There was a breath on the back of Winnie’s neck and she jumped around, expecting one of her siblings messing with her, but seeing nobody there. She brought her wings in close, goosebumps rising across her flesh.

**_Give up now and it’ll end._ **

Winnie walked back to her room hurriedly. Her reflection was there waiting for her. She would use spare blankets for tonight. 

**_“You’re making a mistake. I need to be out. I can’t be in here anymore. I want to be out.”_ **

**** “I don’t care what you want!” Winnie growled, striding up to the mirror in a burst of anger, and her reflection lashed at her, reaching out with razor sharp claws and smashing her skull against the glass.

Winnie awoke with a gasp and purple blood in her bed.

What worried her the most wasn’t the intensity of the vision, not just yet, not this early on when they weren’t a common problem. It was that she worked so hard to make sure she was stable and okay during the day, and now she was finding out how easily she could rip herself to pieces in her sleep.

Winnie sat up, and the first thing she was met with was the blank stare of her reflection.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Winnie hissed before it could even open its mouth.

**_“You’re ruining my body.”_ **

**** “This isn’t your body.”

**_“Oh, I apologize. My mistake._ ** **Your shell** **_.”_ **

Winnie ignored it and flung her legs over the side of the bed. She began to tug her stained sheets off of the mattress, causing her reflection to scoff.

**_“What’s this? You aren’t solving your problem with magic? Have you created another version of myself that I don’t know about?”_ **

**** “Shut up.” Winnie growled. Though, she much preferred this version of her imprisoned self rather than the one in her head. That version was much harder to ignore; at least she could pretend this one was a real person she was talking to, even though she was sure it was just a figment of her imagination.

Or, at least, she hoped.

Winnie wiped off her bloodstained claws and arms with some tissues, then gathered up her dirty sheets and began walking them down to the laundry room. She wasn’t lucky enough to not run into anyone on the way there, as she had opened her door to the scythe-like claws of a giant praying mantis standing in front of her.

“Mother,” She whispered, and the mantis screeched and bit her head off.

Winnie awoke with gasp.

What worried her the most wasn’t the intensity of the nightmare, not just yet, not this early on when they weren’t a common problem. It was that the damn motion sensing light outside was the thing that had woken her up of all things. She was grateful for it, though; she didn’t need to develop entomophobia because of a dream, especially when she had Cimex friends and family.

Winnie sat up. The motion sensing light turning on during the night wasn’t that unusual, but it was when it happened twice. When she saw the second burst of radiance faintly through her drawn curtains, she decided to get up and go see what it was. Since the glow only edged around the corner of the house to bleed into her room, she had to go downstairs to check the front yard.

What she found made her heart leap into her throat.

A little squirrel!

Winnie almost found herself laughing, especially when the little animal tussled around with its own tail in the grass, but she made sure to keep quiet, since there were bedrooms on the ground floor and she didn’t want to wake anyone up. After the rodent skittered off into the nearby bushes, Winnie also turned to go back to sleep.

She saw It when she entered her bedroom again.

It was standing outside in the grass, only a few feet away from her window. At closer inspection, it wasn’t an “it” at all, but a man.

His facial features and clothing were unknown because of the darkness, but that was the least concerning thing in that moment. Someone was standing out in the yard, on the property.

Winnie wanted to go wake up one of her parents, but her legs wouldn’t move. She was a little frightened, but not too much. No, she was too curious and intrigued to look away from this stranger.

Slowly, she stepped closer to the window, practically pressing up against the glass to get a better look at him. She squinted, quelling the nagging fear in her stomach with more interest.

The man’s head craned around and their eyes locked together.

One of Winnie’s feet moved back, while the other remained rooted in place. Parts of her were screaming- she had to wake everyone else up because HELLO there was some dude on their property and there was no way in hell she could take him if he were dangerous! She WAS NOT strong! She could barely even work her projectile feathers!

But the other part…maybe he was hurt. Maybe he needed help.

Despite her aversion to most men (what can she say? she can’t trust them), Winnie knew she would want to be aided if she were in his shoes.

Right as she was going to crack the window open to ask if the man needed something, the motion sensor light flicked on again.

Winnie whirled around and bolted out into the hallway, only to remember she had closed her door. Her forehead smacked against the wood and she tottered backwards before collapsing, wings flopping out to either side of her. The world was upside down and blurry, but she could still see her father at her window.

But that was impossible. Her room was on the second floor. His wings weren’t even moving.

Thomas was foaming and drooling at the mouth, scratching at the glass like a starving rabid animal. His eyes were lit up with hunger and rage.

The last thing Winnie heard was her window sliding open before everything went black.

And then, Winnie awoke.

What worried her the most wasn’t only the intensity of the nightmare, but also that she worked so hard to make sure she was stable and okay during the day, and now she was finding out how easily her mental state could collapse on her during the night.

Winnie sat up, and the first thing she was met with was the dark stare of her reflection.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Winnie hissed before it could even open its mouth.

**_“You’re ruining my body.”_ **

**** “This isn’t your body.”

**_“Oh, I apologize. My mistake._ ** **Your shell** **_.”_ **

Winnie ignored it and flung her legs over the side of the bed, rubbing her face with her hands. Her phone went off on her nightstand and she reached over to grab it.

**_“What’s this? You aren’t solving your problem with magic? Have you created another version of myself that I don’t know about?”_ **

**** “Shut up. I don’t need magic to grab my fucking phone.” Winnie growled. Though, she much preferred this version of her imprisoned self rather than the one in her head. That version was much harder to ignore; at least she could pretend this one was a real person she was talking to, even though she was sure it was just a figment of her imagination.

Or, at least, she hoped.

When she opened up her phone, she saw that Alyssa had texted her.

**Greenebean:** I hope you’re feeling better!  💚

**WinnFromSupergirl:** Thank you, Alyssa! It’s really sweet of you to check up on me like this.

**WinnFromSupergirl:** I’m feeling better, don’t worry.

**Greenebean:** That’s good! But if you aren’t well enough for tomorrow’s game, then you don’t have to go.

**WinnFromSupergirl:** I think I’ll be okay!

Winnie leaned back as she continued to text Alyssa, absentmindedly itching at the long, purple scratches stretching down her arms.


	8. Chapter 8

Parts of Winnie resented herself for agreeing to go to the game the next day because the bus ride was hellish.

Because of the gift of flight, school buses, like most vehicles, weren’t always the main mode of transportation, but because the school didn’t trust a bunch of teenagers and one (1) adult to stay together on the fly to whatever location the game was at, they were used.

Nobody really minded the bus. Everyone got a seat to themselves, although several of them usually ended up packing into one to talk or play games to pass the time. Right now, the only one alone was Winnie, huddled against the window to watch the sights, Alyssa, who was asleep, and Coach Dickinson, who was driving. Kaylee and Shelby were sitting together, sharing earbuds and watching a movie on Shelby’s laptop, while Jules, Linda, and Carrie played a card game. The others were beyond Winnie, somewhere behind her, out of the reach of her care.

All was calm.

And then the bus jostled, and Winnie’s stomach churned.

God, it hurt. Every movement of the bus made her stomach ache with tremendous pain, sloshing the little contents inside like the waves at sea. She’d thrown up in her mouth more times than she could count, and the acidic taste of bile had left permanent traces on her tongue.

About ten minutes in was when she had begun to feel the beginnings of a massive headache. And now, thirty minutes later, her headache had turned to stomach cramps and nausea, and the three people in front of her talking so enthusiastically, reminiscing about embarrassing things they did as children, did nothing but continually grate on her ears and worsen the pain. So sue her if she complained about this trip because she always said the school bus wasn’t a good idea because there weren’t any seatbelts and it could be fatal if they got in a crash and she was in pain and she was definitely not in a pleasant mood!

Not that Winnie was ever one to complain out loud. No, never Guinevere Blair Thompson, the pacifist, the timid little baby bear, the one who always had to play devil’s advocate. She would never speak up about what was bothering her, what she wanted, what she thought was right.

Which was exactly why she was curled against the wall of the bus, whimpering quietly to herself.

It didn’t help that the effects of the painkillers were not as strong as she had expected, and she would have to wait four hours until the next dosage. She would have happily downed five pills at once, but she knew better than to abandon her duties as the team manager because of an overdose.

Resting her head against the window pane, Winnie closed her eyes and tried to block out the sounds around her. Just her luck to have forgotten her earbuds, though she had a feeling music wouldn’t even help her at this point. There was really nothing much to do on a long drive if she couldn’t even read a book or look out the window to admire the scenery without wanting to puke. Life sucked so badly right now.

“Do you think in Spanish-speaking countries, they say One?” Jules asked loudly. She never did know how to use an inside voice.

“Let’s gather around the table for a nice game of One,” Linda snorted.

“Can confirm that they do not say that,” Shelby said from her spot next to Kaylee. 

It was going to be a long drive.

* * *

_ “Mama, my wings hurt…” _

_ “I thought I told you to stop calling me that?” _

_ “Sorry, Mama…” _

_ “ _ Guinevere _.” _

_ “S-sorry, Mother…” _

_ “Better.” _

_ “But my wings. They hurt really bad, Mother. Can I please take them out?” _

_ “Absolutely not. What have I told you about having your wings out?” _

_ “I know, but--” _

_ “What have I told you?” _

_ “Nobody will understand what I am, I’ll scare everyone away, and they’ll wanna kill me…” _

_ “Good.” _

_ “I used to be able to have them out, though. My friends wouldn’t do that to me!” _

_ “They aren’t your friends, Guinevere. They were just acting like they were because they fear you. But they won’t anymore, as long as you keep your wings hidden. Their parents have granted you mercy if you do so.” _

_ “Oh…” _

_ “I’m protecting you.” _

_ “Thank you, Mother.” _

_ “I know.” _

_ “I love you.” _

_ “I know.” _

* * *

A hand shook her shoulder, and Winnie’s eye opened. Alyssa was leaning into her seat from the bus aisle, smiling softly. Kaylee and Shelby were both teetering over her from the seat directly in front of hers.

“Hey there, Sleeping Beauty,” Kaylee flashed her a dragon-toothed grin.

“We’re here,” Alyssa said.

“Oh!” Winnie got up quickly, stretching out her sore wings and neck from falling asleep. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Alyssa said. “No worries. Come on.”

The four of them walked out, heading for the locker room that had been given to them for that game. Loud music and chatter were coming from the direction of the huge towering stadium nearby.

It wasn’t long before Winnie was swept in her cheer manager duties--if you could even call them that. Coach Dickinson did most of the work, while she just gave a few commands during stretches. Her job was mostly finished by the time the game started, since she didn’t have to perform or anything.

Shortly after the first quarter, Winnie strayed away from the benches to go get some water. She was hoping to take some painkillers, too, as her arms were starting to hurt again.

She had been good at hiding the scratches from the others for the time being. She just got lucky that it was winter time and she could pull off the long sleeves without question. She had never actually expected avian claws to do so much damage… 

“Winnie?”

Winnie jumped so hard a few pills of Ibuprofen flew out of the bottle. “One moment!” She shouted back to the person as she dove for them, scooping them off of the ground and praying that they were still clean as she put them back where they belonged. 

“Sorry about that! What’s u--” Winnie’s words trailed off as she turned around and saw no one there.

Weird. She swore she had heard someone call her name. Looking around quickly, she noted someone standing on the far side of the locker room. She waved to her to be polite, then grabbed for her water bottle, thinking nothing of it.

Wait--

“Win **nie.”**

Avians didn’t stand on four legs.

**“I know you can hear me, Winnie.”**

Winnie turned, moving painfully slow, to face the towering, beast-like creature at the other end of the room. A toothy grin spread across its muzzle.

**“Hello there.”**

Winnie turned tail and ran.

She could hear its thunderous footsteps behind her as she escaped. Opening the locker room door felt frighteningly slow, but she managed to fling it open and scramble outside. She rounded the corner, only to be faced by the creature. She stumbled backwards a few steps, then squared her wings to try and look tougher than she actually felt.

**“That’s better,”** The creature purred,  **“I didn’t think you would give me a proper hello, Winnie. Vessel. Self.”**

“ _ No! _ ” Winnie yelled.

She felt a hot breath on the back of her neck; the creature was behind her. Up close like this, it was so much more frightening. 

The slavering creature before her was a mockery of the title “WingEater.” Its body was a mesh of pale, freckled avian skin and patchy green pelt, almost like someone had been interrupted mid-transformation into their dormant beastial form, leaving them disfigured. It was crouched like how a person trying to mimic an animal would, its joints not fit for its huge body. Four giant green-cream wings, practically skeletal and missing most of the webbing that would connect the fingers to each other, hung limply around its sides. It had the tail of a gargoyle and the giant paws of a monster, but its face… Oh, its face… 

It was  _ her face.  _ Draped in long, wiry red hair, two silvery eyes stared at her from a head that resembled her own almost perfectly.

“You’re not real!”

That seemed to be the wrong thing to say, as a look of fury overtook The Beast’s rotten face. Winnie preferred when it was smiling. 

Taking the sudden change of expression as a warning, she took off running. The monster screamed her name in rage.

Even if The Beast wasn’t real--it couldn’t be, it couldn’t be--it sure was cruel. It gave Winnie a chance to get away, to run back to the game where safety lied, before appearing before her again. She just blinked her eyes and it was there, reaching out from underneath the bleachers and yanking her to the floor. Winnie saw stars when her jaw smacked against the asphalt. Her claws snagged painfully when she tried to claw away as she was dragged into the shadows beneath the stands. Two massive, clawed hands suspended her in the air.

**“You don’t think I’m real?”** It growled lowly.

The Beast’ grip tightened. It was so painful, like being crushed or getting into a way-too-tight straightjacket.

Winnie grunted and kicked out her legs like she thought it would help her. Her arms were burning and straining painfully. Bones were splintering audibly, making her stomach churn.

**“How real is this, Winnie?”** The Beast roared,  **“It is real enough for you?!”**

Winnie screamed over its insane babbling. Right when she thought her arms would snap in half, the grip loosened. She gasped and wheezed, finally able to breathe.

**“You should watch what you say next time,”** The Beast said, tossing the girl into one of the support beams for the bleachers.  **“Now...let’s talk.”** It was smiling again.

“What…what are you?” Winnie panted, grunting. “I thought--”

The Beast blinked a few times before roaring with laughter. It was a maniacal sound.

**“You think I'm just some figment of your imagination?”** It chortled.  **“No. I am a product of your mistakes. I am a creature of rage and misery! The darkness of your actions gave me life.”**

“B-but--”

**“You have been given your chance to make things right. You should have known better than to play around with magic, little girl. All actions have consequences.”**

Winnie started to push herself up. If she found a friendly face, then this would all end. It had to. Leaping to her feet, she ran, her wings giving her a boost of speed.

When she reached the door to the cheer room on the field and called out to her team, a clawed hand snatched the back of her shirt and yanked her backwards. The Beast slammed her against the wall with so much force she thought her spine and wings had snapped. It was pinning her, trapping her, sneering.

**“You don’t need them.”** It said.  **“You don’t need anyone. And they certainly don’t need you.”**

“Let go!” Winnie yelled, trying to sound tougher than she actually felt.

**“They don’t want you.”** The Beast continued.  **“Not after what you’ve done.”**

No. It wasn't like that.

With a flash of angered denial, Winnie dug her claws into the grooves where The Beast’ talons meet its hands. It roared in pain and stepped back, glaring daggers.

“Go to hell.” Winnie spat.

The Beast stopped rubbing its claws and smirked widely.

**“Can’t you see? We’re already here.”**

It was gone. Winnie was alone. She heard people again. Breathing a sigh of relief, she walked into the locker room and got a warm welcome from the corpses swinging from the ceiling.

Fear poured into Winnie’s veins. She stumbled out of the room and into a world she didn’t know. 

This wasn’t the same school from before; she didn’t think she was even in the stadium anymore. 

There was something wrong with the sky, she realized. It looked as though something was shutting over the horizon, trapping them all in a--

Winnie’s breath caught in her throat.

In a box.

She ran. She didn’t know what else to do so she ran. She ran until her legs gave in and she fell to the floor, gasping for air.

**“You let this happen. You let everything go to hell.”**

The Beast stared at Winnie from on top of what used to be the snack stand, tail lashing. It wasn’t smiling, simply gazing.

“Stay away from me!” Winnie shouted, whirling around. “If I created you, I can make you disappear. What makes you think I won’t destroy you?”

There was that smile again.

**“How can you?”** The Beast was closer now and leaned down to eye level, mere inches away from Winnie’s face.  **“I am you.”**

“No!” Winnie snapped back. “I am nothing like you!”

**“Oh really?”** A large mirror formed in The Beast’s hands.  **“Take a look.”**

Winnie couldn’t even recognize the creature in the reflection. The thing staring back at her looked like a vicious WingEater, dripping in gore.

This thing was a copycat. When Winnie blinked, it blinked. When a single tear rolled down her cheek, it cried, too. She looked down and it copied. Blood coated shaking claws. But those weren’t the reflection’s hands she was gazing down at.

They were hers.

She looked up and she could feel the fur bristle on her body as she trembled. She stepped back, her claws carving out grooves in the dirt, then ran.

It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real!

She hid in the bathroom and curled into a fetal position in the far corner of the stall. The sound of footsteps hitting the cement floor approached, and The Beast started to pound on the door. It said nothing, just knocked.

Winnie closed her eyes, staying perfectly still. Her wings folded over her head like she thought they would protect her. From the other side of the door, its voice whispered her name.

**“Winnie… Winnie… Winnie…”**


	9. Chapter 9

**“Winnie… Winnie…** Winnie!”

Winnie snapped awake, gasping in shock and flinching away from the hand on her shoulder. Her wings floundered, flapping as if she were a startled chicken, and she pressed herself further into the corner, wide-eyed. She stared at the Avem kneeling before her with a frightened expression, then looked around in a panic.

She was…in the locker room bathroom. Why was she in the locker room bathroom? How did she get  _ in _ the locker room bathroom? Wasn’t she in the public one? Oh please, for the love of the goddesses, don’t say she fell asleep on the toilet or something… 

She was in the stall, still, and she was in the corner, as she had been in the other one. Somehow. She still wasn’t sure how she got there.

“A-Alyssa?”

“Yeah, it’s me,” Alyssa said gently. “Are you okay?”

“Wh-what happened?” Winnie asked in a hoarse whisper.

“I was going to ask you the same thing,” Alyssa said, furrowing her eyebrows. “The game is over. I came back in early to get changed, but then I heard you crying in here.”

“Oh,” Winnie swallowed thickly. “Sorry. I-I didn’t mean to make you worry. Or seem like a crazy person.”

She went to get up, but Alyssa grabbed her wrist and she hissed in pain. She watched as Alyssa rose to her feet slowly, like she was trying not to startle her.

“It’s alright.” Alyssa said. “But you don’t look okay.”

“I’m just…tired. That’s all.”

Alyssa hummed. “I see.” She said. “Does this have anything to do with what happened yesterday?”

Winnie shrugged wordlessly, looking away.

Alyssa studied her for a moment, seemingly picking up on her obvious stress. She then smiled and said, “You need to unwind. Come here, sit down. I’ll prune your wings.”

“Huh?” Winnie looked up at her, surprised by the offer. She instinctively pulled her wings around herself, brushing the feathers with her claws. 

Alyssa’s smile only grew wider. “You heard me. Come on.”

Alyssa gently tugged her to the benches in the locker area and made her sit down. But before she went to go grab anything to help tame Winnie’s unruly wings, she turned to her and asked, “Can I prune you? It’s okay if you don’t want me to.

Truthfully, Winnie trusted Alyssa, she really did, perhaps more than she ever trusted anyone- not that there was much competition in that regard, granted. Alyssa, she knew, she  _ hoped _ , was a good person. Even before they became friends, she had never done anything to hurt her or betray her trust. That trustworthiness and safety she provided, constantly, was undeniable and reassuring. She appreciated it greatly.

But on the other hand, she had never felt comfortable letting people touch her. Okay, well, that was a lie. She was extremely touch starved. She was more wary of new touch, because, in her experience, it could only bring pain in the long run. Letting people get close, generally, was something she avoided on an instinctual level, not that anyone ever really tried to get close to her, even before Her Choice. Pushing everyone away had become her brand. 

Glancing at Alyssa with a thoughtful look, she fiddled with the tips of one of her wings, which felt stringy and rough when she wrapped a feather around her finger. If there was a person she could trust with them, it would surely have to be Alyssa. The choice was obvious.

“Sure,” She said to her. 

Alyssa smiled. “I’m going to go grab a brush.”

The swallow did just that, grabbing a brush from her cheer bag, along with some wing oil.

Alyssa sat down on the bench and Winnie turned her back to her, letting her have full view of her wings. Closing her eyes, Winnie took a deep breath. Why was she so nervous? This wasn’t anything she should have been nervous over and yet…it felt almost like a test of trust for them. A trust fall that could make or break all her progress with Alyssa.

“I’m going to start now, okay?” Alyssa told her. She appreciated the hesitation and patience more than she’d ever like to admit.

“Go ahead,” She said, straightening her back and unfurling her wings slightly. “Be gentle, please? I know my feathers may be a bit knotty right now, but try not to pull…”

“Don’t worry, I’ll be careful.” Alyssa assured her. After a moment, she started running her claws through Winnie’s plumage, slowly and gently. It was smart, Winnie internally congratulated her for. It was going to be easier to find and get rid of any knots that way.

Winnie was starting to relax. The muscles in her wings loosened, losing all their tension. So far, she wasn't getting hurt, and the touch was extremely pleasant. Alyssa really did know what she was doing.

“Do you do this with Emma?”

“Indeed,” Alyssa nodded. “Of course, it’s a little different with her because she doesn’t exactly have feathers, but she loves it when I rub her wings. Especially right here.”

Winnie couldn’t help but gasp in bliss when Alyssa began to massage small circles against the wrist of her wing. She immediately bit her tongue, her entire face heating up as Alyssa laughed.

“I guess it works on some Avems, too!”

“I-I guess so,” Winnie uttered out through her embarrassment.

“You’re so cute,” Alyssa chuckled.

“I-I-- Ah--” Winnie floundered, and Alyssa laughed again. And then-- “Ow!!”

Alyssa had accidentally pulled on a knot too hard, and Winnie shouted and recoiled in pain. Alyssa jerked her hands back instantly as Winnie leaned forward, breathing heavily in a way that suggested that the feather pulling had given her more than just a shock of discomfort. Her eyes wide open from astonishment, her hands shaking, wings pulled in tightly and ear tufts folded back.

It had been a while since anybody pulled her feathers, but she remembered the pain and humiliation from it clearly. After all, it was a constant for most of her life (before she Fixed Things), and was far from the worst thing she had experienced, but even so, it was not pleasant to be reminded of that.

“Winnie? Honey? Are you okay?” Alyssa asked, worry thick in her voice. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. Are you alright?”

Winnie took a deep breath and leaned back slowly. She nodded. 

“Yes,” She said. “I’m okay.”

“I’m sorry.” Alyssa said guiltily.

“It’s okay,” She said again. “It happens sometimes.” She wasn’t as relaxed as she was at the start, but pulled herself together pretty well regardless. After a short moment of hesitation, she felt the brush on her wings again, gently stroking down. Slow and careful at first, growing more steady overtime as her plumage was getting smoother.

“Winnie?”

“Hmm?” Winnie hummed. Her eyes were closed in contentment, black ear tufts fluttering in the way they would do when she was happy. Wonderful tingles and sparks were crackling through her back with every stroke of the brush. She had forgotten how nice it felt to get her wings played with. She could fall asleep to this feeling…

“What happened? Over you being in the bathroom and whatnot… I haven’t seen you since the start of the game.” There was worry in Alyssa’s voice. The topic alarmed Winnie, and she tried to shake herself back into awareness, but her feathers being brushed just felt so nice…

“Nothing,” She mumbled lazily. “Just something dumb that happened. It was on my mind and I needed to be away from everything. The game was noisy.”

“So you fell asleep in the bathroom?”

“Umm-- Yeah.” 

“Did you not sleep very well?”

“Mm-mmm.” Winnie shifted.

“You are very endearing when you’re half-asleep,” Alyssa said as she set the brush aside and began to part some feathers into three portions. Winnie lurched slightly.

“Shh. Stop fussing. I’m just braiding your feathers.” Alyssa shushed her gently.

Winnie relaxed again. She even leaned her wings back into Alyssa’s hands and breathed out the softest sign of contentment.

“Do you…” Alyssa paused for a moment, clearly considering her words carefully. “Do you, I don’t know, wanna talk about it? It’s cool if you don’t, I don’t want you to feel pressured or anything.” She dragged her claws through one of the three groups of feathers. “I know it helps for some people, getting everything out. Shelby will, like, make these bracelets out of her silk with beads that have letters on them and she’ll spell out what’s bothering her. Then she will cut it up or burn it or do something and that’s how she’ll get over, or at least cope, with something. If that makes sense.”

“No, no, it does.” Winnie sighed. “That’s really cool, actually. Good for her.” Pause. She fumbled with her claws, clicking them together nervously. “I just-- I don’t want to scare you off.”

Alyssa’s hands froze for a moment. “What are you talking about?”

“I--” Winnie swallowed thickly. “I-I, umm…”

Alyssa turned Winnie around and gently cupped her cheeks. Winnie melted into the touch instantly, pressing into it hungrily like a kitten seeking warmth; she couldn’t help it. Alyssa noticed this and smiled softly.

“It’s okay, honey,” Alyssa said. “You can tell me.”

The words were bubbling in the back of Winnie’s throat. After five years, they were finally going to come up… 

“I-I--” Sweat beaded her forehead. “You…you can’t be mad at me, okay? Please…”

Alyssa furrowed her eyebrows. “I’d never be mad at you, Winnie. I promise.”

Winnie nodded. After a long, painful moment of hesitation, she finally rolled down her sleeve to reveal the purple scratches stretched down her flesh.

**_Yes yes YES!!!_ **

For a long moment, Alyssa just stared.

Then, with tentative, gentle claws, she brushed the marks, worry and confusion on her face.

“Winnie…”

Tears were pricking in Winnie’s eyes like hot needles. The emotions were beginning to rise, now- fear, humiliation, relief, pain, distrust, guilt.

“I-I…” Nothing else came out. Her throat closed.

“Your blood, it’s…”

It was too much. Winnie’s chest began to tighten. Her breathing grew quick and erratic. Then, all of a sudden, she couldn’t breathe at all. Her lungs were constricted with hot iron bands.

“It’s…”

She couldn’t take it. She couldn’t handle this. She thought she would be relieved to share what had been bothering her all this time, but it only made her feel worse. She felt /awful/, as if someone were reaching inside of her and pulling her insides out.

“Purple…”

A strangled sob escaped Winnie. Her eyes, shiny and bulging, rolled in her skull. Spasms shivered through her wings. She couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t--

“Are you…?”

“Alyssa, I command you to STOP!”

And Alyssa did. Her mouth shut, her body went rigid, and her eyes became blank.

Winnie stared up at her, horrified.

Had she just…?

Oh goddesses, she _had_.

Winnie never thought she would enchant one of her best friends. She never thought she would use her magic on them like that. But here she was, staring up in terror at Alyssa, who was no more than a petrified corpse under the command of her claws.

And it felt _awful_.

_Winnie_ felt awful.

She began to sob loudly, intensely. Her entire body was rattling with the weight of her cries. She gripped at her head, raking her claws across her scalp, trembling violently, then looked back up at Alyssa.

“Oh, no, no, no…” Winnie whispered hoarsely. “No, no, no, no…!”

The panic was building. She had to do something. She couldn’t just leave Alyssa under her spell.

Winnie took several shuddering breaths, then said, “Alyssa, I enchant you to forget the conversation you just had with me. You don’t remember anything about me showing you my arms or seeing my blood. You don't even remember me in the bathroom. Forget it all.”

Alyssa blinked and the slight glaze that had formed over her eyes disappeared. She looked down at Winnie and smiled.

“Oh, Winnie!” She said. “I didn’t see you there!” When she noticed Winnie’s tears, she tilted her head. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Winnie collapsed into her wings, screaming and crying.


	10. Chapter 10

It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling. Enchanting someone. She had done it many times before, even if she didn’t have the clearest memory of doing so. But the side effects were there, lingering in the back of her brain like a storm about to roll in on a bright and sunny day. It was there. It was impossible to forget.

Winnie thought she could remember the second time she felt this way. The first was the stuffed animal. That was innocent. Pleasant. Amazing.

The second time was during one of the most terrifying moments of her young life, and she probably would have died at the age of seven if she hadn’t been gifted with magic. 

Mary was there when it happened. Mary was

( **_you little imp you filthy beast why would you do this_ **

_ i’m sorry Mama i’m sorry i didn’t mean to _ )

mad. Little Winnie had accidentally broken something precious that had belonged to Mary. And then Mary had caught her, furious, and dragged her into the den while Thomas sipped his coffee from the kitchen.

The little girl she used to be, that poor little girl, screamed like she was being gutted alive, but nobody

( _ Mama Mama stop stop it Mama i’m sorry i’m sorry  _

**_stupid little girl you wretch you disobedient dog_ ** )

could hear it thanks to the hill their mansion was situated on.

There were fingers around her throat, she remembered the skeleton fingers, the subtle scratch of too-sharp, too-close mantis claws. Mary’s big thumbs pressing down on her little airways, choking her, strangling her, suffocating her. She tried to fight, 

( _ Ma-ma, s-top-- can’t b-reathe-- M-ama-- my throat oh Mama my throat-- blood--on my tongue-- Mama Mama Mama _ )

tried to get away, tried beating her wings against Mary, but Mary was much too strong for her tiny body. 

Mary throttled and wrung her neck like a little bird’s, listening to the brilliant sound of her nerves crackling and bones cracking and collarbone chipping away at the pressure. At the time, she didn’t know that the only thing that had saved her from a broken neck was her own powers commanding her spinal cord to hold firmly in place.

She hadn’t felt the tingling then. Mary on top of her distracted her from the sensation of her gift.

( **_you disobedient creature you worthless waste of flesh you need to be punished for what you’ve done you need to be punished for doing this to me_ ** )

Mary got off of her, and Winnie lay broken on the floor, swollen blue tongue lolling out of her mouth, throat inflamed with black bruises, purple blood in her eyes from asphyxiation. She was sprawled like a calf cut down from a hook in the slaughterhouse, gurgling on her metallic blood, drooling and frothing all over the expensive angora living room carpet. She wasn’t breathing, not really, not on her own, it hurt too much to do so, so her powers enchanted the air around her and pulled it into her lungs so she wouldn’t suffocate. The gifts worked her heart, keeping it thumping in a steady rhythm as it flexed her larynx to deliver the much-need oxygen.

( _ Mama Mama Mama help i can’t breathe Mama my chest it hurts it hurts Mama my eyes there’s blood in my eyes _ )

Above her, Mary’s eyes were lit up with a sick, diseased light, drool on her chin, panting like a rabid dog. She stormed away, and Winnie had thought that was the end of it, but then she returned with something jangly and weird-looking. At the time, Winnie had no idea what it was. She saw it in the “museum room” that her Mama and Daddy liked to show off to guests, but didn’t understand what it was.

Until that moment, of course.

( **_why did the goddesses have to curse me with the likes of YOU_ ** )

Winnie remembered floundering like a fish out of water when Mary pounced on her again, wrestling the rusty thing on her face. It hurt too much to scream, but she knew it would have been muffled by the metal anyway.

Mary had wanted to get rid of her. She knew nobody would have cared if the malformed child went missing. But she didn’t expect such a fight.

( _ help help something help _ )

( _ something something _ )

( _ knife KNIFE HELP _ )

And a knife came, zipping through the air faster than lightning and slashing right across Mama’s cheek.

Mary’s reaction was instantaneous.

She threw Winnie to the side and staggered backwards,

( _ yes yes good no more hurt Mama i am not bad _ )

shrieking in agony in a way Winnie had never heard before. She dropped to her knees, still drooling all over herself like an insane hellhound, blood pouring down her face, and began to scream and cry helplessly.

( **_WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU!!!!!!!!_ ** )

And then, Mary fainted. Winnie fainted, too. And when she woke up, everything was as it should be, the metal thing put away, the blood wiped from the floor. Maggie dressed the huge black and blue bruises on her neck, and Winnie did not ask how she got them. Maggie made a makeshift sling for the broken collarbone she didn’t even realize she had, and she didn’t ask about how she got that, either. Nobody said anything about the huge gash across Mary’s cheek that would later leave a scar that never faded. Two weeks later, Mary would test positive for pregnancy and then Winnie’s replacement, her younger eyed hawkmoth Cimex sister, Abigail, was born.

It was a normal affari for her. Being replaced. Being thrown away. Being cast aside for someone who looked normal. She was surprised it hadn’t happened yet with her friends.

It’d been a week since the incident in the locker room and Winnie knew she was worrying everyone. If it wasn’t the way her feathers began falling out because of stress, then it was the way her eyes sunk into her skull with lack of sleep. And if it wasn’t the way her eyes sunk into her skull with lack of sleep, then it was how often she jittered and flinched like she was awaiting a blow at any moment. She found herself peeking around corners, expecting that hideous version of her to be waiting for her, and avoiding mirrors, not wanting to see her reflection. She came to despise her own voice, her own appearance, because it reminded her too much of that  _ thing.  _ She second-guessed everything she said, thinking she sounded too much like the version of herself in the mirror, and she began to wonder if she was slowly turning into it.

Her friends were worried, she knew they were. Alyssa looked the most concerned, as she had been the one who had seen her breakdown in front of her, seemingly for no reason. It was hard to look at her. Every time she did, Winnie was just reminded of what she had done.

She had created a rule for herself. Never enchant your friends. She was never going to use her magic on them unless it was for a good reason. But now she had broken that rule and she was drowning in the guilt.

During lunch, Winnie picked at her tray of food. She had wasted money on something she wasn’t going to eat- just another thing for her to feel awful over.

“Are you coming, Winnie?”

She looked up and blinked at Alyssa, who was looking at her with a kind smile.

“Huh?” She tilted her head. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t paying attention. What were you saying?”

“The sleepover,” Alyssa informed her. “I’m having a sleepover tomorrow. I want you to come over.”

“Oh!” Winnie realized she had never actually been over to Alyssa’s house before. But why would Alyssa even want her over after witnessing her freak out firsthand? “Yeah, sure!”

The feathery tips of Alyssa’s ears fluttered. “Wonderful!”

Winnie smiled back at her, but couldn’t block out the hiss in the back of her throat, warning her softly. When she looked around, she spotted her reflection on the nearby window, and its eyes were hollow.

* * *

__ “Pillow, I command you to float in the air.”

At her order, Winnie’s pillow levitated in the air. 

“Now, come back down in the same spot from before.”

It obeyed.

Something strange was going on deep within her. Respiratory had dropped to 6 breaths per minute. Heartbeat thumping at 40 beats per minute. Temperature up to 107°, which should have killed most people by now. Muscles and tendons tightened. Immune system kicked into overdrive, white blood cells being produced faster, lymph nodes swelling up in response to an infection that wasn’t there. Her body was burning energy she didn’t have. When she would check her weight later that night, she would find that she had lost ten pounds in one day.

“Monkey, come to life.”

An old, purple stuffed monkey in her pyramid of plushies on a table suddenly twitched and stood up on stubby legs. It walked off of the table, fell flat on its face, then pushed itself up again, unharmed. It began to totter around the room like a toddler walking for the first time.

39, 38, 37, 36, 35… Her heart rate was lowerinh to a highly abnormal and normally very dangerous pace.

But…this wasn’t very dangerous, was it? 

It was…natural.

__ “Quill, draw a picture.”

The phoenix feather quill on her desk was lifted by invisible hands and began perfectly drawing a picture on a piece of paper, stopping every once and awhile to get more black ink from the inkwell nearby. It drew a strange, monstrous creature with huge wings and a thick tail and sharp claws.

“Winnie, it’s time for dinner!”

“Thank you, Maggie!” Winnie called back, and she hoped Maggie couldn’t hear the quaking in her voice.

She shook herself out, feeling her muscles and tendons tingle at the loss of magic in her limbs, and stopped all of her enchantments. Her body functions slowly returned to normal, heartbeat speeding back up, blood pressure lowering, breathing evening out, temperature going down. The only thing that stayed at a peak were her nerves, which sent waves of exhilaration washing through her as she walked downstairs.

Maggie was in the dining room setting the table. Her dark blue dress swished around her ankles as she moved around the corners to place plates and a tray of chicken pot pie that smelled wonderful. Winnie’s stomach growled softly; it’d been awhile since she had eaten a full meal and she felt as if she were starving. Using her magic burned a lot of calories.

“Winnie, my dear?” Maggie said. “Can you go finish the tea for me, please? The water should be already boiling.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Her parents would often berate her for using “ma’am” towards a maid. But it had them who bred the discipline and manners into her.

Winnie walked into the kitchen, where the tea kettle whistled and the Alexa played some instrumental music Maggie would often listen to while doing her work. With clockwork precision, she swept by the stove, picked up the kettle, and deposited just the right amount of boiling water into each teacup sitting on the counter. As she left tea bags to dissolve inside, she lifted the lid of the sugar jar and picked up two cubes, placing a certain amount in each (one for Mother, none for Father, two for her). Then, she removed the bags once they were finished their process of flavoring and carefully took the tea cups over to the table, nearly getting smashed into by one of her younger siblings running by. After setting down all the cups, the rest of her family bustled into the room and sat down to eat.

Thomas sat at the head of the table, always wanting to be in charge. Mary was beside him, and right beside her was eight-year-old Abigail. Then, there were the six-year-old twins, Annabelle (barnevelder Avem) and Leonard (peacock Avem); five-year-old Molly, a black-faced hornet; and baby William, a plumed whistling duck.

They were everything Mary and Thomas loved. And everything Winnie wasn’t.

Winnie picked at her food with her fork. She looked down, and her plate was covered in the gore of her skewered dinner. Mushed peas and shredded chicken mixed together like lumpy green and white organs on the platter.

“Stop picking.” Mary said sharply, noticing her.

“I’m not,” Winnie mumbled.

“Do you not like Maggie’s cooking?” Abigail piped up. A smirk tugged at the corner of her lips. “That’s SO RUDE! She MADE THAT for US and you HATE IT!”

“I didn’t say that!” Winnie yelped, looking around fearfully, not wanting Maggie to hear this. “Stop being mean, Abigail.”

“She isn’t doing anything.” Thomas said, glaring at Winnie. He always jumped to defend his ‘little princess.’ “Leave her alone.”

“But--”

“Don’t talk back to me, Guinevere.” Thomas said lowly.

Winnie dipped her head in defeat. “Yes, Father. I’m sorry.”

Dinner continued. The twins were babbling about something they did in school that day. Their high-pitched voices grated roughly through Winnie’s ears.

When the table quieted down in between conversations, Winnie finally gathered all her confidence, fluffed her wings, and said, “Mother, Father, I’m going over to a friend’s house tomorrow.”

Mary quirked an eyebrow. Thomas set his fork down slowly. All of her siblings looked incredibly interested.

I’m gonna start doing what I want from now on.” Winnie went on slowly. “I’ve thought over it, and I think it’s for the best. You can’t control me forever. I’m-- I’m not your toy.”

Her parents didn’t say anything, but Winnie knew her father was getting angrier and angrier by the way his feathers were starting to stand on end. Her mother, on the other hand, was tapping her wickedly-curved claws on the tabletop. Winnie watched them uneasily, confused at the lack of outburst.

“You can’t stop me.” Winnie added, shakier this time.

Mary shook her head silently, then flung her cup of tea at Winnie.

Winnie shut up instantly, only letting a sharp cry of pain escape her lips. The brown liquid splattered across her face and chest and began oozing its way down her black and white breast feathers, making them smell strongly of peppermint. She clawed for a napkin and wiped the hot, sticky liquid off, and prayed any burns wouldn’t be visible.

“Oh dear,” Mary mused at her struggling. “You’ve been burned. So sad. Your friends won’t want to have you over now.”

Winnie grit her teeth. “They will, Mama! You can’t stop me!”

“You aren’t going.” Mary said firmly. “Now shut your mouth and eat your dinner.”

“No.” Winnie said, swallowing her fear.

“No?” Mary whipped her head up, nearly making Winnie lurch off of her chair in terror. “What do you mean  _ no _ ?”

“You can’t control what I want to do.” Winnie said, ruffling her feathers to make herself seem bigger than she actually was. “I want to be with my friends. And why do you care anyway? It’s not like you ever want me around.”

Mary stared at her intensely, then stretched out either side of her neck and said, “Thomas. Get the jaw trap.”

Inky black dread poured out through Winnie’s organs like a thick, dark oil spill. In an instant, her entire body tensed, her wings snapping to her side, and her breathing hitched.

“N-no, wait--”

Thomas got up and walked out of the dining room. She could hear a door opening down the hallway and her heartbeat banged wildly against the inside of her chest.

“Mother, don’t,” Winnie wheedled hoarsely. “I-I’m sorry.”

But her mother’s uncaring stare did not change.

It wasn’t long before Thomas came striding back in with a clanking piece of metal clenched tightly in one hand.

“NO!!” Winnie leapt away, beating her wings to give her a boost of momentum. She catapulted out of her seat, making it a few feet out of the dining room, but Thomas advanced on her and grabbed her by the back of the neck. “No, no, Father! Let me go! I don’t want to--”

A metal plate was forced into Winnie’s mouth, causing her to sputter and gag. She thrashed wildly, beating her wings like a captured bird in a vain effort to escape. Mary came over and helped hold her down with her four arms, weighing her to the ground.

The jaws of the device began to snap down into place like a bear trap around her face, old rusted riggings and hinges clicking into order. The thing was heavy and cold, the abrasive iron digging into her sensitive skin.

The interlocking web of futures inside of her head suddenly grew, and several new timelines appeared to her: The jaw trap springing during the struggle and ripping her bottom jaw off; the jaw trap malfunctioning while she was wearing it and crushing her skull like a soda can; the jaw trap still on when she went to school on Monday; the jaw trap lying broken at her feet, oozing blood off of its maws; the jaw trap on her parents, with them looking horrid out of its restraints.

She had to do something. She had to get free.

“Sto-- Moth--er-- I--” Winnie’s words were garbled over the metal plate in her mouth, which cut into her tongue uncomfortably. She shook her head wildly, hoping to loosen the grip of talons on her.“St-- NO!!”

Her mother and father froze. Their  were mere inches from Winnie’s face, so ready to seize her and trap her and abuse her some more. But they did not. They didn’t move. And Mary and Thomas stared at them in horror, as if they were watching each finger get chopped off one by one.

The spell had been cast with just a mere flashing thought-  _ Mother, Father, don’t move. _

Her siblings were alerted by the odd behavior of their parents and snapped out of their intrigued gaze from watching her get mistreated. All of them, save for William, bustled over and stared bug-eyed at their petrified parents.

“What did you do to them?!” Abigail demanded, wheeling around to Winnie.

“M-Mama?!” Annabelle shook one of Mary’s wings, only to get no response.

“D-Daddy?!” Leonard looked close to tears.

“What’s wrong with them?!” Molly cried.

Winnie hooked her claws in the half-put-on jaw trap and ripped it off. She knew the dangers of doing so, especially with such an old object, but it didn’t spring on her. She threw it to the side, where it landed with a loud clatter against the floor, then turned to her younger siblings with a hardened stare.

“I command all of you to stop.” She said in a cold voice, and they did. They all froze, just like their parents.

The power tingled in her claws. She wanted to exact revenge on her family with it so badly. She wanted to do it all herself, plunging into them with her own talons, ripping them to pieces for everything they had done to her. But instead she said, “When I go upstairs and close my bedroom door, you will all have no memory of what had happened. You’re going to forget everything that went down here and go back to eating.  _ You will not bother me _ .”

No reaction, not that Winnie expected one. She turned and walked upstairs. When her door closed, she could faintly hear the shuffling of her family as the spell wore off. They were talking, but she couldn’t quite make out what they were saying. Either way, she didn’t care. She was alone.

When she glanced at her mirror, the only monster that greeted her was herself.


	11. Chapter 11

The next day dawned grey and drizzly. Upon arriving at the Greene household, Winnie nearly suffocated Alyssa when she thrusted a bouquet of red and yellow flowers into her face when the door was opened. Alyssa sputtered and coughed, her crest feathers shooting up in shock, and Winnie yanked her arms back quickly.

“Sorry, sorry!” Winnie squeaked. “I-I didn’t mean to, I’m sorry. Umm-- Th-these are for your mom.”

Alyssa rubbed her ticklish nose with a smile. “It’s alright, Winnie,” She assured her. “And that’s so sweet of you to do! Thank you!” She swept one wing behind her. “Come in! I’m so happy you could make it!”

Winnie shuffled inside, looking around at the neatly-furnished house, which was decorated for Thanksgiving. Kaylee poked her head out of the kitchen, as she had been talking to Alyssa’s mother, and beamed.

“Winnie’s here!!” She exclaimed, and two other heads peeked out- Shelby and Emma.

“Hi, guys,” Winnie said shyly.

“It’s about time!” Kaylee said, which made the tips of Winnie’s ears flame red in embarrassment from underneath her hair. “We’ve been waiting for you FOREVER!”

“Oh, s-sorry,” Winnie stammered.

Shelby rolled her eyes. “It hasn’t been forever,” She said, brushing Kaylee with her wing and giving her a teasingly stern look. She turned her head back to Winnie. “I’m happy you’re here.”

Winnie hoped her tail feathers were wagging like a dog’s. “M-me too.”

Kaylee, Shelby, and Emma all shuffled out into full view, and a beautiful woman came shortly after. She had hawk-like features, but bore the plumage of a golden pheasant. Her long, flowing tail brushed delicately against the ground as she walked over to Winnie.

“So, you’re Winnie,” Mrs. Greene said. “It’s so good to finally meet you. I’m Veronica, Alyssa’s mother.”

“Winnie. It’s nice to meet you, too.” Winnie said. She held up the bouquet of flowers, and the entire thing shook with the intensity of her quaking anxiety. “I-I got these for you, m-ma’am.”

“Oh, thank you!” Mrs. Greene took them. “These are beautiful, Winnie.” She then looked at the other girls. “You three could learn a thing or two from her.”

Kaylee held her wings up in a shrug. “I am very possessive of my treasures.”

“I would give you a butterfly to eat, but I don’t think you would react very well,” Emma said.

“Please don’t eat a butterfly,” Shelby said, pulling her peacock butterfly wings in close to her.

Mrs. Greene shook her head with a laugh. “Make yourself at home.”

“I will. Thank you.” Winnie said.

“Come on, Winnie!” Kaylee was suddenly latched onto her arm. “Let’s go see the princess’s room!”

Alyssa rolled her eyes. “You really gotta stop calling me that.”

“Never!” Kaylee shouted as she bounded up the staircase, dragging Winnie with her. The other quickly tailed after them. Emma quickly got in on the playfulness and grasped Alyssa’s bedroom doorknob with a cheeky grin.

“I now present to you, the chambers of the queen!” She bellowed.

“Princess,” Kaylee whispered.

“She’s a queen to me, bitch,” Emma said back.

With that, she hauled open the door to reveal the room behind it. Winnie took a moment to think about how it looked like something that would be found in her own house: the heavy velvet drapes that Shelby had spun and dyed for her as a gift (she remembered Shelby talking about doing so for everyone); the silk rugs with their swirling patterns of gold and crimson thread; the vanity in the corner, decorated with perfume bottles that caught the glow from a tall, arching lamp in the corner; the small, polished mahogany tree that held all Alyssa’s jewelry, which she had apparently curved herself; the deep, rich scarlet walls; the rainbow lava lamp on the desk that stuck out like a sore thumb in all the sophisticated beauty. In particular, Winnie was highly cognizant of the large stuffed dolphin on the burgundy velvet comforter of the bed. 

“Alyssa Greene? More like Alyssa Red.” Kaylee commented, earning a playful jab from one of Shelby’s wings. “What? That was funny!  _ I  _ am funny.”

“So,” Alyssa said, talking over them, turning to Winnie. “What do you think?”

Winnie’s lips were slightly parted, her eyes a little wider than usual. At her side, one claw slowly tapped against her thigh, like she was slowly beating a drum. 

“It's,” Winnie started, “It’s a lot like my room.” Just minus the excessive vulture culture and taxidermy, of course.

“I suppose it is,” Alyssa said modestly, clearly trying very hard not to let her current lapse in confidence show. Not that Winnie would mind if she did show it. People should be able to boast from time-to-time.

“I’m sorry,” Winnie said quickly. She turned her head like she was looking at Alyssa, but her eyes were lowered more towards the floor than to Alyssa’s face. Did she think that she wasn’t allowed to meet her eyes or something? They had been growing closer for quite some time now, it wasn’t as though they were strangers. “That was impolite. I didn’t mean-- I meant to say-- It’s beautiful, Alyssa.” 

“Well, thank you,” Alyssa said. “And no need to worry, hun. I’m not offended or anything.”

Winnie nodded, but didn’t say anything.

“That’s Sir Dolphin,” Emma put in helpfully, gesturing a wing to the dolphin stuffed animal.

“Sir Dolphin?” Winnie looked at Alyssa.

“I was not a creative six year old,” Alyssa said, spreading her fingers with a shrug, and they all laughed. “You can put your stuff down wherever you want to. No need to hold onto it all day.”

“Oh,” Winnie glanced down at her bag. She had been digging her claws into the strap like it was a seatbelt on a rollercoaster. She hesitated for a moment before walking across the room and leaning it against a drawer. She stood slightly bent over the bag, her back turned towards the others, long enough that she was sure that Alyssa was about to ask if everything was okay when she turned back around. 

“Um,” She said, her claws clicking against each other nervously. “What are we supposed to do?” 

“What do you mean?” Alyssa asked. Another flare of blush rose to Winnie’s face; she began to worry that she may combust if she didn’t cool down soon, and THAT would certainly not be good guest etiquette.

“I meant at, um,” Her claws stopped clicking and grapsed together tightly, “at this kind of an event?” A large, flustered sigh. “I’m sorry, I’ve never done this sort of thing before.”

“A sleepover?” Shelby piped up, tilting her head.

Winnie nodded shyly. Her wings twitched, as if she were considering bailing through the window and flying home. Though, that wouldn’t be a good idea…

“We just hang out,” Alyssa told her patiently. “We’ll eat dinner later, probably watch a movie, and see what happens after that.” She opened one wing and Winnie shuffled into it. “It’ll be alright, I promise.”

Winnie nodded again, then managed to give her a smile. “Alright.”

Alyssa smiled back. “Wonderful!” She said. “It’s going to be fun, Winnie.”

* * *

“Kaylee, put that mop down! We just got here and we are  _ not _ starting this already!” Alyssa’s voice rattled loudly.

Bringing along everyone to the store has proved to be a very bad idea already. Winnie could tell that Alyssa hadn’t realized just how chaotic Kaylee, Shelby, and Emma would get when they were all out together. 

Apparently, Alyssa had rationalized that going out and buying all the ingredients for dinner as a group would be much more fun than doing it with her mother beforehand. And it was, the car ride there had been incredibly entertaining (they were using a car for the groceries they would be picking up, as nobody liked flying with bags on their arms). But when Kaylee convinced Emma to try and race with shopping carts by using their flapping wings as a motor the minute they got inside the store? That was when the line had to be drawn.

It took enduring half an hour of non-stop arguing over shopping lists and food choices for dinner (“Kaylee, for the last time, we are NOT only getting eggs. That’s horrible. We can’t live off of that.” “Sis, we ain’t living with you.” “Still!!” ; “Winnie, do you REALLY think you can survive only on ice cubes, Ibuprofen, and chicken noodle soup?” “If I ration the Ibuprofen to only four a day…sure.” “ONLY FOUR--” ; “If I can’t get my eggs, then Shelby can’t get her weird Spanish food!” “They’re TORTILLAS!” ; “Can I please just get a cucumber?”) to simply get there, and Winnie could tell Alyssa was probably wishing that she had just tied them outside to a pole like they were dogs instead of torturing herself with escort duty. And that was before they even stepped inside the store.

“Now remember, we grab the items on the list, we pay, and we leave!” Alyssa barely reined in the impatience already slipping into her voice. “We still have things to do at home.”

Kaylee, on the other hand, had other ideas. 

“Oh, come on, ‘Lys! Let’s have some fun!”

“I agree with Kaylee.” Emma nodded, earning a smoldered look from her girlfriend. “What? This place is huge! You probably won’t be able to watch us at all times no matter how hard you tried. Besides, there’s stuff we want to look at.”

“Is it really going to be two hours over at the tampon section, Emma?” Shelby cut in curiously. “Surely there can’t be  _ that _ many choices.”

Emma shot her a look while Kaylee exploded into laughter.

“Well, we gotta try them on!” Kaylee said.

“I don’t think it works like that.” Shelby said and, at the same time, Alyssa yelled, “NO!”

“How else are we supposed to know if they work?”

“Pray.” Emma said and then snickered. Alyssa couldn’t help but snort, and Kaylee’s frills perked up.

“Haha! We broke her!” She high fived Emma and Shelby.

Alyssa rolled her eyes. “Come on. Let’s get started already.”

* * *

“I bet you’re wondering why I gathered you snacks here today.” Shelby said, standing in the middle of the frozen food aisle.

“I’m not a snack!” Emma barked. “I’m the whole damn meal!”

“Then I’m a buffett.” Kaylee puffed out her chest.

“Buffet.” Shelby corrected.

“You’re thinking of Jimmy Buffett.” Emma nodded.

“Fight me.”

“What kind of buffet?” Emma asked.

“Pasta bar.”

“With chicken?”

“Chicken Alfredo?”

“With chicken?”

Shelby stared at Emma with a confused expression before she looked up at the ceiling, processing what she had just heard.

“Emma, it’s chicken--” She cut herself off as she blinked and tried to wrap her mind around the stupidity she was faced with. Emma was struggling to contain her snickering.

“What about pizza?”

Shelby narrowed her eyes at Kaylee, who was biting her lip to keep herself from laughing.

“No, it’s a pasta bar. Not a pizza bar.”

“Good, because buffet pizza sucks.” Alyssa said in approval from the side. She and Winnie were both spectating while they were actually trying to find ingredients for dinner.

“Sausage?” Emma gave another suggestion.

“It is pasta?”

“Uhh…”

Shelby stared at Emma expectantly.

“No.”

“THEN IT’S NOT GOING IN MY FUCKING PASTA BAR!”

* * *

After one and a half hours (a fourth of which was spent being lost or messing around), the group finally left the store to go back home. Nothing was on fire and everyone seemed genuinely happy with the trip.

Once they were back at the Greene house and all the groceries were put away (which had been a little disastrous since Kaylee INSISTED she take every bag in at once, which then prompted Alyssa to scream, “KAYLEE THE  _ EGGS _ !!!”), dinner was started. That was when Alyssa found a block of cheese in the utensil drawer, which somebody had apparently decided was a knife and then could not for the life of her find the cream cheese she swore up and down they bought. Watching her spin around and search in utter confusion had Kaylee and Emma on the floor in hysterics.

The Great Cream Cheese Mystery of 5:47 was quickly followed by:

“Excuse me, but what in the name of God is this?”

Emma looked up from her sprawled out position on the floor to see Alyssa holding up some gun-like object. She nearly started laughing all over again.

“That’s a drench gun I found for half off.” She said.

“Ah, I see. Why?”

Beside her, Kaylee had erupted into snorts and snickers. Emma had to take a few deep breaths to get the words out properly.

“Why not?”

Alyssa narrowed her eyes at her girlfriend before setting the drench gun back on the table, muttering something about ‘this being hers now’.

And then after that…

“ALEXA, PLAY DESPACITO!”

“WHY--” Alyssa shouted miserably.

Poor Winnie, who had been standing way too close to the Alexa and spectating what was going on, tottered backward with her hands over her ears when the notorious song started to blast from the speaker. Kaylee laughed loudly, throwing her arms into the air. Mrs. Green, who just walked back inside after greeting Angie (who was apparently staying over as well?), was very confused.

“This is an INSULT.” Shelby spat, glowering at Kaylee, who is doing a terrible job at singing along to the lyrics. “Are you mocking me?”

“Not everything is about you!” Kaylee said before rushing to get back into the lyrics (although it didn’t matter because she was still poorly singing in Spanish).

“Alexa, stop playing Despacito!” Alyssa begged, but the music was too loud and her plea was unheard.

“Alexa said for you to perish,” Emma commented from where she was sitting on the bar counter, watching the chaos unravel.

“What is going on?” Mrs. Greene said, still very confused. 

“I’m a star, bitch!” Kaylee warbled, using a ladle as a microphone.

“Language!” Alyssa hissed.

“Sorry- I’m a star, m’lady!”

“I’ll take it.”

“My ears…!” Winnie moaned off to the side.

Kaylee grabbed a spatula and tossed it to Shelby. “Sing it, Shelby!”

“This is a spatula.”

“I know that,” Kaylee groaned, exasperated. “Just sing! Come on!” She started up again, this time with Emma backing her up. The two of them whistled and cheered when Shelby eventually joined in.

“And now Winnie!!” Kaylee pointed to the redhead and thrust the ladle into her face, which made her freeze up.

“I don’t know Despacito,” Winnie sputtered out into the ladle like it was an actual microphone, causing the others to howl in laughter. She blinked before bursting into a fit of giggles.

“Then we must dance!” Kaylee decided, taking Winnie’s hands and spinning around the kitchen with her while Shelby belted out the lyrics and Emma (tried to) back her up.

“Alexa, please--” Alyssa pleated, but it was far too loud and her begging was far too choked up to be heard by the speaker, which was probably laughing at her agony.

“YEAH!!” Kaylee hollered when the song finally ended. “That was AWESOME! We are AWESOME!” She was grinning from ear-to-ear, and the others couldn’t help but do the same.

The little performances went on for a few more songs, which included: Kaylee sliding into Emma and slamming them both into the fridge during Don’t Stop Me Now; Emma slowly waving around a cucumber, Kaylee waving a whole candle, Winnie waving her hands, and Shelby tearfully saying, “This song is so touching” during The Climb; Alyssa rushing to turn off Flesh; everyone stopping everything to do the iconic movements in Bye Bye Bye; Emma and Kaylee laughing loudly at Never Gonna Give You Up while Alyssa, Winnie, and Shelby genuinely jammed out; Alyssa doing a passionate solo of I Will Survive while the others whistled and cheered; and everyone getting in the straightest line ever to do the Cupid Shuffle. 

By the end of it, their mouths and throats and stomach all hurt from smiling and laughing so much, but they wouldn’t want to have it any other way.

Winnie never wanted it to end.


	12. Chapter 12

__ **“It is a cry for help. It is a reflection. It’s getting worse. It cries out. Cry for help. It’s just a matter of time.”**

_ That was what was written on her Algebra II teacher’s whiteboard, but she knew the mannequin sitting in the bar stool at the front was incapable of writing anything like that.  _

_ The classroom was empty, aside from Winnie, sitting in her desk in the middle. She blinked and looked around, not remembering the fly to school. Maybe she took the bus? _

_ The bell rang and she gathered her belongings. When she was walking out, her teacher said, “Have a good day!” even though she had been the only one inside. _

_ She went to Journalism next. It was relocated to the basement because the actual classroom was being used for testing. _

_ There was no basement in the school. _

_ There weren’t any tests going on that day, either. Not that she knew of, at least. But sometimes she would hear screaming and metal shearing, and assumed many kids were failing. _

_ IPC was next. Everyone stood for the pledge of allegiance. When they looked out the window, there was no flag. Winnie didn’t meet the eyes of the thing at the top of the flagpole. _

_ They sat down to listen to the morning announcements, but it sounded different than usual. She didn’t remember the student over the intercom sounding like she was being held against her will, forced to recite a script or risk getting strips of her flesh sliced off.  _

_ “Hi, um, I-I-I-I don’t have a whole lot of--of time. Um, and, and… Oh man, I don’t know where to start. F-f-football tryouts are b-being h-held after school t-today. She’ll-she’ll-she’ll, uh, she’ll- she’ll, um, she’ll probably be coming here really really soon, um. Okay, um, um, okay, she-she is not what she claims to be. Ow! Umm, I, umm, the soccer team, umm… Uh, she-she-she wants to eliminate us all, uh, a-a-and she’s--she’s coming. She’s coming. She’s, uh, she’s, uh-- I’m sorry…” _

_ Now that Winnie really thought about it, she didn’t think she had ever actually seen the girl who did the morning announcements. She never left the office. Maybe she couldn’t even leave. _

_ There was a test in her IPC class. An actual test. There wasn’t any screaming or grinding metal, but one student still said, “If someone dies during an exam, we all pass!” _

_ Everyone laughed. It was funny because he was a hooded crow Avem and crows symbolize death. It was funny because it was true. _

_ “Who wants to take one for the team?” He went on, still laughing. _

_ Winnie laughed with him. She wondered who it would be this time. _

_ Her fourth period was ASL II. Talking wasn’t allowed inside. Your tongue would be cut out if you did. Students had to hide their ears, too. The teacher got very jealous if she saw them and ripped them off.  _

_ In the class, kids sign with severed fingers, broken hands, and shattered wrists. Sometimes they don’t have hands at all. The teacher will smash them if they fingerspell wrong. Winnie once saw her rip a hand down the middle. The Hydra boy who it happened to signed a presentation right after, even when his pointer finger and thumb were dangling on threads of flesh from the rest of the wrist. _

_ She went to lunch next. Hers was D lunch, the latest one. She thought the D stood for Death. _

_ “Farm fresh!” The lunch lady told her with a smile. She dumped a slop of chunky pink goop onto Winnie’s tray, then added some broccoli, even though Winnie hadn’t asked for any. Winnie didn’t correct her. There were strips of red caught between her sharp teeth. _

_ Winnie sat by the window at a bar table instead of the regular ones. When she looked outside, she saw the mascot running around in the grass. She didn’t know why it was out there. She didn’t even know who wore the costume. Its eyes were so empty. _

_ Someone was eating their friend on one of the tables. They were a vulture Avem. They were staying true to their kind. But Avems could not consume raw meat. Winnie knew they would be vomiting blood later that day. _

_ 5th period was American History. Miss Allen calls the name of Winnie’s older sibling instead of her own name. Winnie didn’t have an older sibling. _

_ There was a part of the ceiling tile missing in Miss Allen’s room. When Winnie looked up through it, she could see wires and tubes and eyes. She didn’t tell Miss Allen about the new student. She thought it was just herself up there. Her eyes were the same shade of grey. _

_ Theater was next. Everyone had to wear masks while inside the auditorium. It disguised them as beasts so the thing that lived underneath the stage wouldn’t bother them. Sometimes the masks drove students insane. It was hard to become such a creature, to be someone that you weren’t. A planthopper Cimex once said it was “like wearing someone’s skin.” Now Winnie understood why the masks smelled so bad. _

_ The winter play they were doing was Marisol. The principal said yes to it only because he was scared of the thing in the auditorium. They were planning on actually setting someone on fire for the scene where the homeless man burned alive. The actor of the character wouldn’t stop crying. _

_ Winnie had to go up to the costume loft to grab some things. It smelled awful in there. The different costumes were musty and starting to fray at the seams. Some of the wing props looked too real. On her way out, Winnie tripped over a shoe and she glared in annoyance at the body it was connected to. _

_ In her last period, English II, they were reading Lord of the Flies. This would be the 137th time she read it. She decided not to bring this up. She knew how eager the teacher was to have a head on a spike that she could use as a diagram for the book. _

_ At the end of the day, the same hooded crow Avem from IPC approached her. _

_ “If you get badly hurt in school, they’ll pay for your tuition.” He told her. He didn’t laugh this time. His eyes were glazed and hollow. “Well… Thanks for covering my college fees.” _

_ Winnie looked down, and there was blood all over her claws. _

_ She hadn’t been writing in red ink in all of her classes. _

* * *

Winnie awoke to a fit of horrific screaming, then realized it was herself.

She was laying on the floor of Alyssa’s bedroom, having been too modest to take an air mattress. She was thrashing in the pallet she had created out of some old quilts that Alyssa had dug out of the upstairs closet. It was similar to her freak out episode in the gym a week ago, but even more terrifying. At least with that she didn’t have the feeling of intense terror hanging over her like a silver sword.

She wasn’t awake. Not really. But she was aware of the things around her. Her eyes were barely open, but she knew the bonds of her nightmare had receded. For now.

“Winnie! Winnie, it’s okay! It’s okay!” 

A voice cut through the sound of her own shrieking. Her eyes finally opened; Alyssa was above her. Her own eyes were as wide as saucers. Her hair was a complete mess from just waking up; her feathers were worse. Winnie would have laughed at how undignified the great Alyssa Greene looked if it weren’t for the fact that all she saw when she looked around were those bodies and that  _ thing.  _

Hands closed around her forearms; Winnie screamed louder. Her claws flew out and hooked in Alyssa’s back. She dragged them downwards as if she were trying to carve out the wings of her offender, drawing bright red blood. 

“Alyssa!” Another voice arose from the mayhem. It took her a moment to realize it was Emma who yelled, most likely alarmed by the blood. 

Winnie heaved her breaths, looking all around as she thrashed and struggled. She saw Kaylee with her own claws brandished and Shelby with her mandibles out, but Alyssa flared one wing at them, urging them back.

“Get away!” Alyssa shouted. “I’ve got her! Get away!” She turned back to Winnie and her voice softened instantly. Her hands, warm and shaking ever so slightly, cupped Winnie’s face, making her look. “Hey, hey, shh... It’s okay, honey. It’s okay. You’re okay. You’re safe.”

Winnie tried to look, but she kept seeing things flit in the corners of her vision. She thought she could smell the blood from her dreams. She retracted her claws and they twitched in the faint glow of the rainbow lava lamp on Alyssa’s nightstand. There was red on them.

Winnie screamed louder.

Alyssa straddled her hips, and that scared Winnie even more. Alyssa proved to be powerful for a fancy pigeon, grabbing her by the wrists and pinning her arms to the ground to keep her from clawing. Winnie took her beating her over the head and back with her wings, but Alyssa did not relent.

“Winnie.” Alyssa said, and her voice was like a mermaid’s song in the middle of a raging hurricane, calm yet firm, even in the eye of such chaos. Even when she was being viciously battered with two bony wings. “Winnie, listen to me.”

The feathers on Winnie’s bristled. She fearfully looked up at Alyssa.

“You’re alright. You’re okay.” Alyssa said. “It was just a nightmare. You’re safe now. Look around you.”

Winnie looked around. The things in the corners of her eyes were starting to recede and disappear. She looked back up at Alyssa, whimpering. When a few tears slipped down her cheeks, Alyssa dared to release her arms to wipe them away. Winnie did not lash out at her.

“You’re okay, sweetie,” Alyssa murmured, and if Winnie wasn’t listening before, she definitely was now when the pet name was used. She blamed it on how attention-starved she was. “You’re okay. You’re safe, I promise.”

Soft brown wings curved down to brush against Winnie’s neck and face. Winnie whimpered. Alyssa slowly lowered herself to the ground to lay next to her on the messy pallet. Winnie curled into her instantly, crying softly.

“It’s okay,” Alyssa whispered, running her claws through her hair. “It’s okay. You’re going to be okay…”

Winnie wished she could believe her.


	13. Chapter 13

**“Can you hear them screaming? The birds?”**

Winnie looked up at the creature gazing out of the window with tired, bloodshot eyes. She didn’t like how fog appeared on the glass when it breathed. It felt too real.

“I hear you.” 

She was laying on the floor of Alyssa’s bedroom, having been too modest to take an air mattress. But this time the pallet she had created out of some old quilts that Alyssa had dug out of the upstairs closet was tangled and messy around her, a laughable excuse for a bed. She wasn’t thrashing in it anymore, at least. 

She then picked up on the warmth around her and looked to the side to see Alyssa right next to her. Alyssa’s head was pillowed on some bunched up blankets, eyes shut in peaceful rest. Sometimes her nose would twitch or the feather tufts on one of her ears would flick, but she didn’t wake up. Her wings around Winnie didn’t pull away, either.

Nobody else was in the room, but she could faintly hear chatter from downstairs. In their stead were feathers littering the hardwood, and Winnie was then humiliatingly reminded of what had happened that night. Her wings were sore from using them to hit Alyssa, and when she looked back at Alyssa, she noticed purple and yellow bruises appearing on her dark skin. A full shiner had already made itself known at the corner of her left eye, malevolent and baleful. But the worst thing was when Winnie lifted her hands, there was dried blood on her claws.

Alyssa’s blood.

She looked back at the creature.

“Why are you here?” 

**“I have every right to be,”** Sepulture said. It bent its freakishly long neck backwards like some kind of sick gymnast and smiled a bone-chilling at her.  **“I am you, after all.”**

Winnie flinched in the way people would do when they woke up after thinking they were falling from a great height and her eyes popped open wide. The creature was no longer at the window, but cold sweat was still beaded on Winnie’s forehead and her heart was hammering in her chest.

Alyssa finally stirred. Her wings twitched around Winnie. When she opened her eyes, the first thing she did was wince when her bruises must have throbbed. Winnie looked over at her, and the two of them just stared at each for a moment, remembering what had gone down to get them in that situation.

“Good morning.” Alyssa finally said, smiling warmly despite the injuries that Winnie had inflicted upon her.

Winnie faltered for a moment. She didn’t know why she had expected Alyssa to get mad at her. Perhaps it was because she had every right to.

“Morning,” Winnie replied, not wanting to be rude by just gawking at her like an idiot. She didn’t want to seem crazier than Alyssa surely thought she was.

Alyssa’s wings finally pulled back, and Winnie felt strangely cold when they weren’t wrapped around her. She sat up and stretched, then winced again. Instead of bringing any attention to her pain or finally yelling at Winnie, she looked around at the empty air mattresses.

“Damn, did they really just leave us up here alone?” She said, grinning at Winnie.

“I think so,” Winnie said. “I hear them downstairs.”

“Then downstairs we shall go.” Alyssa got up. “I’ll meet you down there, okay? I need to change my shirt.”

Winnie realized it was because the shirt she had on was ripped in the back and soaked in dried blood. Through the slashed fabric, she just barely caught a glimpse of angry red scratches upon smooth flesh.

The guilt did not leave her, even when nobody brought up what happened.

* * *

A storm blew in when Winnie finally left Alyssa’s house. The rain made her wings heavy and fogged up her transparent second eyelid, but she still took her sweet time flying back home. She was sure her parents wouldn’t be worried over her being missing, but they would certainly be angry that she didn’t ask for permission to go over to her friend’s house.

And she was right because when she walked through her front doors, the first thing she was met with was the shrill voice of her mother yelling, “GUINEVERE!!!”

She knew she should have just gone through the window.

After shaking off her hair, wings, and tail feathers on the stoop, Winnie walked to the living room to face the wrath of the mantis.

“Where were you?” Mary demanded. Her huge eyes bore straight into Winnie’s soul.

“Alyssa’s house.” Winnie told her, seeing no point in lying. Mary would surely be able to detect it with her sharp occeli.

“Why?”

“She invited me over.” Winnie answered honestly again.

Mary made a  _ tsk-tsk-tsk  _ sound while shaking her head. She rested one of her huge claws on Winnie’s shoulder, and the row of spines dug deep into Winnie’s flesh.

“You should have asked for permission.” Mary said. “It would have been a shame if something had happened to you…”

Winnie glanced at the claw on her nervously. It was thick and heavy; she had to lock up her knees to simply stay standing while it was on her. She didn’t want to know what it must have been like to be hit by it.

“I’m sorry Mother,” Winnie dipped her head, swallowing thickly. She didn’t want to look at her mother’s beady eyes anymore. They creeped her out.

“It’s alright, dearest daughter.” Mary’s other claw hooked around the back of Winnie’s neck and pulled her into her thorax. The green chitin was smooth and thickly armored against Winnie’s goosebump-ridden flesh. “I’m glad you’re home safe.”

Winnie could only nod as she was pressed against her mother’s massive body. Usually she would have been giddy to be embraced like this, but the massive claws crossed over her back, keeping her from squirming away, made her very unsettled.

“Come now,” Mary finally released Winnie from her vice. “It’s time for dinner.”

Her mother knocked over furniture and decorations while she walked to the dining room. Winnie followed wearily and saw that all her siblings were already at the table. But something was off about them. She didn’t think they usually had gaping holes where their throats used to be, but she also didn’t pay enough attention to them to know for sure. When Winnie felt wetness on her claws, she wiped them on her pants. She didn’t want to know what it really was.

She sat down in her usual seat. Her siblings looked at her blankly. Abigail had her heart ripped out. Winnie tasted something vile in the back of her throat, but it wasn’t bile.

“Winnie, did you say hello to your father?” Mary called from the kitchen. Winnie could see her huge abdomen poking out of the archway.

“No,” Winnie called back to her.

Maggie then came whisking over. It wasn’t actually Maggie, but Winnie didn’t say anything about it. 

Something heavy, hot, and rotten was draped around Winnie’s neck, causing her to arch her spine. She swallowed thickly, this time actually tasting bile.

“Don’t be rude, Guinevere.” Mary said. “Say hello.”

Slowly, painfully slowly, Winnie craned her head down to the decaying albatross around her neck. It was dead, she knew it was dead, she could feel the squish of its organs against her shoulder, but it still raised its head and stared up at her with the dull, avian eyes of her father.

The oven dinged. Mary’s abdomen raised up from the archway.

“Maggie! Get the food out before it burns!”

Maggie rushed over without a word. The smell of something awful filled the whole house. Winnie could barely suppress a gag. She thought she preferred the smell of the albatross.

“What are we having?” Winnie asked. Perhaps talking would return at least a shred of normalcy to this waking nightmare.

“Fried chiroptera,” Mary answered her. She walked out of the kitchen and sat down where Thomas would usually sit. The wooden chair turned to splinters beneath her weight.

“What?”

Maggie came out with trays. She set them down, and Winnie could see the charred, smoking bat wings that rested upon them. Her siblings dove for each limb and began tearing into them with their claws and teeth.

“Don’t worry, darling,” Mary said, catching Winnie’s gaze. “There’s an extra special meal for you. You aren’t being left out of eating anymore.”

Maggie came out with another plate and set it in front of Winnie. It was a silver platter with a shiny lid. When Winnie hesitantly lifted the lid, she met the eyes of the severed head inside.

It was a Vesper. She could tell by the brown nubs where his bat ears used to be. She had never seen this man before, and yet she felt an odd sort of connection to him.

Was this...?

“Say hello to Henry, Guinevere,” Mary said. She smirked widely, and her mouth was full of horrors. “Your father.”

Winnie threw up all over the table. 

The head began to scream. But that was impossible! The albatross looking at her was one thing, you could survive at least a little while with your organs spilling out, but this--this shouldn’t happen. It shouldn’t be able to open its mouth, and it certainly shouldn’t be able to make any sort of sound.

But as she continued to listen, she realized that the scream wasn’t the scream of a man. It wasn’t one singular scream, either, rather several screams, as if dozens of people were crying out at once. And then she blinked her eyes and there was no head in front of her anymore, but the screaming continued anyway.

She looked up, dripping in bile, and realized the screams were coming from her family.

“Ewww!!” Annabelle and Leonard squealed.

“Ugh, you’re so GROSS!” Abigail barked.

“Guinevere, what the fuck is wrong with you?” Thomas snarled.

“Are you even listening?” Mary shouted. “Answer us, brat!”

Winnie shot to her feet, sending a pool of vomit that had landed in her lap to the floor, which then made Annabelle, Leonard, and Molly shriek in disgust even more. She staggered backwards, eyes practically bulging out of her skull, then turned and ran, leaving the mess and her yelling family behind.

When she burst into her bedroom, the first thing she saw was the magpie sitting on her window sill.


	14. Chapter 14

Winnie touched her earring and said, “Earring, I enchant you to shield my thoughts from any mind readers.”

It was the first thing she did when she woke up that morning. Not that she really slept that much. Her head was full of fog from nightlong restlessness. Her entire body ached with insomnia. Her eyes were itchy and sore. She didn’t want to go to school, but she didn’t want to stay at home and face the irritating wrath of her parents, either. Or her own reflection.

Winnie hauled her aching body out of bed. She didn’t have the energy to take a shower, despite her throwing up on herself the day before, so she just sprayed herself down with perfume and let her hair be greasy. 

She ended up riding the bus to school, as she was much too tired to fly and the last thing she wanted was to fall asleep in the sky. Not that falling to her death wasn’t unwelcomed.

There were a surprising number of kids on the bus, despite them easily being able to get to school quicker if they just flew. Winnie theorized that they might have been stalling something or maybe they just like the rocking of the bus. Or maybe they couldn’t fly at all, she didn’t know.

Somehow, all the seats were taken, so she had to sit next to some green Hydra middle schooler that was slumped against the window and read a book. He didn’t look up when she sat down.

There were a few more stops before the middle schoolers were dropped off at the middle school. Winnie instantly curled against the window when the seat was emptied. Her reflection appeared on the glass when the bus pulled out of the bus ramp.

**_“What are you doing with yourself?”_ **

Winnie didn’t answer. She didn’t look away from its glass gaze.

**_“What are you doing with_ ** **myself** **_?”_ **

They stared and stared and stared.

**_“Soon.”_ **

The reflection disappeared. Winnie tried to sleep for the rest of the ride.

* * *

In theater, the class watched Rear Window. Before they began their winter final, Mr. Oliver wanted the class to do movie reviews over different highly ranked movies. They had already seen Citizen Kane, which was probably the most boring thing Winnie had ever watched before, despite it apparently being the best movie in the whole world.

Winnie sat next to her friends like usual, like always, like she did every day, but something felt different this time. They kept glancing at her, usually out of the corner of their eye, in the most subtle way possible, and she knew they were thinking back to her fit during the night at Alyssa’s house.

She knew they were thinking about how messed up she had become.

Alyssa, like with most things, was the most patient in the group. Alyssa repeated over and over, simplified things that were too confusing for Winnie’s stupid fish brain to comprehend, lended a wing to hide under when things got rough.

Alyssa was smart in a way Winnie wished she could be.

Winnie tried not to think about that. She tried not to think about people being better at things than she was. She knew how those thoughts caught like hooks in her fish-mouth brain and tugged and tugged and tugged and tugged until she broke the surface, struggling to breathe.

Kaylee, Shelby, and Emma were usually good. They loved Winnie enough to not snap at her when she said something stupid or accidentally hit them with one of her wings. They made her laugh and smile. Kaylee played around with her and Shelby would sometimes let her mess with her silk and Emma constantly reminded her about how great Vespers really were.

They were good with that. Winnie loved them so much.

She loved them enough to let them be, to pull herself away, to shut herself away inside her as best she could when she found that-- when she realized she wasn’t--

When she saw the clench of Kaylee’s jaw and the twitch of Shelby’s nose and the flick of Emma’s ears and the way they glanced at each other, and it was never mean, it was never intentional, it just…

Winnie, at least for the most part, knew herself enough to know when she was too much, and she loved them enough to spare them the discomfort of having to actually tell her she was too much, to figure out how to explain that she had overstepped, to put into words that they had limits.

People had limits. She tried not to push them.

Others, like teachers and adults, were the least patient. The others tried, they always tried. Winnie liked that they tried. But the others got a pinch between their eyebrows after the third time they repeated an explanation, like they were starting to wonder if Winnie was just being a little shit. The others were quick to get annoyed, or to fake annoyance, and sometimes she couldn’t tell the difference. Sometimes it felt like there was no difference.

It was just--

It was so hard to focus when her head was so full of noise. She knew her grades were dropping ever since she casted that stupid spell on Alyssa. She knew her teachers were becoming concerned, too, especially when she was usually the top of all her classes. But it was impossible to center herself on school when her reflection glared at her anytime she looked at any reflective surface. 

They wouldn’t understand. Nobody would understand. It was better to keep to herself than risk spreading the infective knowledge onto others.

She forgot to say goodbye to her friends when 6th period ended. She just gathered all her things and left as quickly as possible, skittering off to her last class. She felt more exhausted than she had that morning.

In English II, they were reading  _ Lord of The Flies _ . While Winnie was getting her book and folder out, something fell out. A folded piece of paper. She blinked at it on the floor. She kept her backpack clean and always put things in their respective folder. 

Someone must have planted this.

She picked the paper up and opened it. What was written inside made her heart drop into the pit of her stomach and her entire body go hot.

**“i kNow YOuR SeCReT”**

She read it over and over again, her breath hitching more and more. And each time she did, the panic inside of her rose higher and higher.

Somebody knew. 

Who?

Somebody  _ knew. _

The revelation made her feel sick. She was now dizzy and faint. She thought she was going to pass out.

Who could it be? Who was it? One of her friends? No, they wouldn’t do something so cryptic… 

She had to find out.

Winnie asked to go to the bathroom. The teacher let her, and she quickly bustled off. After making sure nobody else was inside with her, she turned to one of the mirrors, delicately touched it with the tips of her claws, and said, “Mirror, I enchant you to reveal the name of whoever wrote me that note.”

The surface of the glass seemed to ripple for a moment before, as clear as day, the name of the avian appeared in big, blocky black letters.

**“N I C K”**


	15. Chapter 15

Winnie slumped down in her seat when she got back to class, dazed. 

Nick. Nick-fucking-Boomer. Of all people, why  _ him?  _ With her luck, he had already told half the school about what she was. And if he hadn’t, then she had to stop him before he could get the chance.

Winnie spent the entirety of her last period worrying herself sick over the shocking news. When the bell rang, she lingered inside for a moment to cast a spell.

_ Lanyard, I enchant you to let me look through the eyes of Nick Boomer without him knowing. _

She grabbed onto either side of her school lanyard as if it were a harness for a rollercoaster and closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she was no longer in her own body, but rather, Nick’s.

He was standing by a set of double doors, talking to his friends. His voice was incredibly loud and close in Winnie’s ears, as if he were actually right behind her. She studied his surroundings and quickly became aware that he was at the exit in the C hallway. If she hurried, she could catch up to him before he left.

Winnie blinked and was back in her own body. She quickly grabbed her things and ran out of the classroom, racing to where she had seen Nick. Luckily, he was still there when she arrived.

Because of how sharp Avem claws were, the scratches Winnie had given to Nick were now scarring across his face in four vicious streaks. It hadn’t fully healed yet, still scabbing, but Winnie doubted that even when it did, there would be marks left behind.

For a moment, Nick narrowed his eyes at her when she approached, then relaxed his brow. His three friends, on the other hand, looked intrigued.

“Watch out, Nick,” The yellow and aquamarine Hydra said teasingly. “Your greatest foe is here!”

“Defend your face!” The great egret Avem shouted while laughing.

“Or she may just rip your pretty little eyes out next!” The orange Hydra added.

Nick rolled his eyes. “Oh, fuck off.” He said. “I’ll catch up to you guys, okay?”

The orange Hydra gasped. “Are you two going to have angry sex?!”

Winnie and Nick both wrinkled their nose in disgust at each other. Nick’s friends burst into laughter.

“I’m fifteen,” Winnie said.

“I have standards,” Nick said.

Nick’s friends cracked up some more until Nick shooed them away with his wings. The moment they were out the door and out of eyesight, he rounded on Winnie so fast she flinched. He came at her like a storm, grappling onto her arm with his powerful vulture talons and dragging her into the nearby janitor’s closet. Winnie barely had time to process all of this before she was slammed into the wall by the collar of her shirt.

“I know you wrote the note,” Winnie said.

“I know what you are,” Nick said back.

“No you don’t.”

Nick replied by dragging his sharp claws down her side, slitting her open like a fish. She yowled in pain. Dark purple blood began to spread through her yellow shirt. Nick stared at it, horrified for a moment, then looked back up at her and snarled, “ _ Yes I do. _ ”

He carelessly tossed Winnie aside, causing her to cry out again when she landed on her injured side. She rolled over and yanked up her shirt to inspect the damage. The gashes weren’t deep enough to be fatal, but  _ goddesses above _ , did they hurt. Tears of pain pricked in her eyes as she pawed at the wounds helplessly.

“I knew it.” Nick seethed. “I fucking knew it!” When Winnie whimpered loudly, he glared down at her. “Stop fucking whining! Just heal yourself!”

“It doesn’t work like that, dumbass,” Winnie grunted, pushing herself against the wall. She grabbed a rag that was draped over the side of a bucket and pressed it to her side to try and stop the bleeding. 

Nick looked enraged at being insulted, then confused. Even a little bit curious. He tilted his head. “What are you talking about? It’s goddess magic! You can do anything!”

“ _ No,  _ you  _ can’t _ ,” Winnie said. “I think I would know.” She screwed her eyes shut when her side contracted painfully. “It-- Magi isn’t limitless. You can’t, like, end world hunger or stop a war or something like that. That’s too powerful for the magic. Because things that inflict suffering were created by Pylorus and he’s stronger than the four goddesses, so even their magic can’t stop it. So I can’t just magically heal myself.” She leaned her head back against the wall. “If only it were that easy…”

Nick looked skeptical. “Really?”

“Yes, really.” Winnie said. “How--how did you even find out?”

“Your blood,” Nick said. “I saw it when I pulled your earring out.”

“Which you still haven’t apologized for,” Winnie grumbled.

“Not going to,” Nick said. “But I had to know for sure, so I went digging through some old yearbooks from elementary school and,” He pulled out a yearbook from his backpack and opened it to a specific page. There was Winnie when she was in fourth grade, smiling at the camera, her features warped from the way they were now. “I found this.”

Winnie stared down at the photo of her younger self in horror. It had been years since she had seen what she used to look like. She cursed herself for not thinking to change any photos of herself when she casted her spell.

“What  _ are  _ you?” Nick asked.

“Nick, freeze!”

Nick froze.

“Oh goddesses, oh goddesses, oh goddesses…” Winnie muttered to herself. 

Despite being petrified, Nick’s eyes were wide and darting around everywhere. He was still conscious and was probably terrified at his body getting paralyzed against his will. His horror-struck expression only made Winnie’s guilt even worse.

“ Okay, okay, calm down, Winnie, calm down… It’s all okay. Nobody knows anything.” Winnie took a deep breath. After checking her wounded side, she pushed herself up to her feet and looked at Nick. “Okay. Now. Be Nick.” 

She flicked a claw at him. 

He closed his eyes, then opened them again. They were wide. “What the FUCK?! WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME?! YOU FR--” 

“SHH!!” 

In an instant, Nick’s mouth slammed shut. Winnie watched in horror as he clawed at his lips, drawing blood with his sharp talons, still making muffled screams. 

“N-no! Stop! Stop!” 

He stopped, freezing, and his eyes went blank. 

“O-okay, umm... Be, umm, Nick, but...nice! Be nice! And you never saw me! Yeah! You’re clueless!” 

Nick closed his eyes, then opened them and looked around in visible confusion. “Where am I? Who are you? Are these WINGS?!” 

“Stop!!” Winnie cried, and Nick stopped. “That’s worse! Oh, goddesses, what have I done?” 

She ran her claws through her hair, pacing again. “Valtiel’s fangs, why can’t you just be something simple and easy to work with like a capybara?” 

Suddenly, Nick  _ was _ a capybara. 

“OH MY GOD--”

Nick looked up at her in visible confusion, probably wondering why she was so tall of a sudden. And then he looked down at himself, at his webbed animal feet, and screeched. He leapt backwards, scrambling unsteadily on four legs. Buckets and mops fell over with a loud clatter when he hit them in his panic, and Winnie lunged down to grab him before anyone could hear him and come inside. 

“Be quiet!” Winnie whispered hastily. Nick replied to her by biting her wrist, causing her to yell out in pain. “OW!! You jerk! Haven’t you already done enough damage?!”

Nick, even with his animalistic features, appeared to glare up at her with his big bronze eyes, still clamping down onto her wrist with his large rodent incisors.

“You have to be quiet,” Winnie said. “Please. I can fix you, but you can’t make any more noise. If someone catches us, I’ll be taken away and you’ll be stuck as a capybara forever.”

This seemed to get through to Nick because he released her wrist and stopped squirming around. Winnie let go of him, then grabbed another rag to press to her fresh wound.

“Thanks a lot for this,” She grumbled, looking down at the twin puncture holes in her pale skin.

Nick snorted and flicked his ears.

“Okay, yeah, MAYBE it was my own fault for panicking, but you shouldn’t have snitched in the first place! I couldn’t trust you not to tell anyone!”

Nick rolled his eyes.

“Don’t give me that, asshole. You would have told people and you know it.”

Nick huffed and looked away. Winnie slumped to the ground with a sigh, her wings flopping out and sprawling limply on the floor.

“You can’t tell anyone,” She said. “You saw what I was. If people found out…” She shook her head. “Your reaction was bad enough. I can’t lose people I’m actually close to.”

Nick glared at her.

“What? We aren’t friends! You ripped my earring out!”

Nick thought about it, then nodded. He sat down like a dog in front of her.

“I don’t like using my magic on people.” Winnie opened her palm and looked down at it. Glowing green, flame-like essence seemed to wisp from her claws when she thought about her Magi, and Nick stared at it in awe. “I don’t want to erase your memories. Doing that to people--it haunts me. So you have to promise me that you won’t tell anyone about this.”

Nick nodded.

“Okay. You better not be lying. You know what I can do.” The wisps from her claws faded into flickering embers. She set her hand on Nick’s head and closed her eyes. “Nick...I enchant you to turn back to normal.”

_ Don’t make me regret this... _


End file.
